


Kasai: A Foot Clan Story

by TmntXSonic2003



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2012), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Origin Story, Alternate Universe, Bad Parent Splinter (TMNT), Based on the 2012 series, Bisexual Male Character, Donatello (TMNT) Needs a Hug, Donnie Has A Girlfriend, Family, Gay Male Character, Heroes to Villains, Homophobic Language, Interspecies Relationship(s), Interspecies Romance, LGBTQ Character, Leo Needs a Hug, Mikey Has A Girlfriend, Mikey needs a hug, Multi, Murder, Mutant Powers, Mutants, No Leorai, No Turtlecest (TMNT), Nudism, OCs - Freeform, Origin Story, Raph Has A Boyfriend, Raphael (TMNT) Needs a Hug, Rasey, Surrogate family, TMNT AU, Villains to Heroes, Violence, apriltello, bebop and rocksteady are a couple, bebop and rocksteady are nudists, both leonardo and michelangelo's characters will change, changing the origin story, leonardo will be less serious, main character will be an OC, michelangelo will be more serious, no Tcest, no leo/karai shipping or relationship, roles have been reversed, shredder is a tragic hero, splinter is a piece of garbage, splinter is a terrible father, splinter is evil, splinter is homophobic, splinter lies to his sons, splinter lies to the turtles, story will be told from the villains perspective, villains are more interesting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:48:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 52,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26061409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TmntXSonic2003/pseuds/TmntXSonic2003
Summary: When John Kasai joined the Foot Clan, he didn't think much of it. He thought it would be a fun hobby. Little did he know that it would lead to a life of love, violence, chaos, and mutants. And he wouldn't have wanted it any other way.AU of the 2K12 series. Warning: Violence, Language, Dark Themes, Nudity (Nothing Too Graphic), and Controversial Character Changes.
Relationships: Bebop/Rocksteady (TMNT), Casey Jones/Raphael (TMNT), Donatello & Leonardo & Michelangelo & Raphael (TMNT), Donatello/April O'Neil (TMNT), Donatello/Raphael (TMNT), Leonardo/Michelangelo (TMNT), Michelangelo (TMNT)/Original Female Character(s), Shredder (TMNT)/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	1. John's Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> All rights go to Nickelodeon and Eastman/Laird. This story is an AU of the 2012 series and it will be more focused on the Foot Clan, rather than the turtles. The main character of this story, John Kasai, will be an OC of my own creation. Warning: Violence, language, dark themes, and nudity. Hope you enjoy.

John’s POV  
You’re probably thinking this is going to be the typical, average hero story. A story where the hero defeats the villain, saves the world, gets the girl, and lives happily ever after. We’ve all heard of that story at least once in our lives. And if you think this story will be the same, you’re wrong.

Very incorrect.

You see, in the world I live in, there’s no such thing as a true hero or a true villain. Good people can do shitty things, while bad people can perform good deeds. Personally, I see the world as a grey place, rather than black or white.

(Sigh) Well, I suppose it’s about time I properly introduce myself. The name is John. John Kasai. I’m currently 35 years old. Born on August 15th, 1977. I’m a Caucasian male who was born and raised in Osaka, Japan. If you were curious, my last name means fire in Japanese. You could already tell I was destined for greatness. I was born an orphan, as my mother passed away giving birth to me and my father was killed in a drive-by shooting a few days later. A middle-aged Japanese couple later found my helpless self in an alleyway and decided to raise me as their son. Their names were Harukichi and Mei and they were the best damn parents anyone could ask for. They fed me, put clothes on my back, put a roof over my head, helped me with my schoolwork, and showered me with love and affection.

When it comes to childhood, I would say mine was pretty good. I did very well in school (Yes, my folks fit the Asian parent stereotype), made some friends, and did some after-school activities. While most kids played basketball, soccer, and football, I was more interested in the world of martial arts.

Particularly, the world of ninjutsu.

As a kid, I thought ninjas were the coolest thing ever. They wore all-black outfits, used throwing stars, chopped off people’s limbs with swords, blended in with the shadows, and so on and so forth. My dream was to be the most badass ninja in history, but I knew it would take a lot of work in order to achieve that goal. So, at the age of 14, I began my training at a local dojo, which was headed up by world-famous celebrity, Chris Bradford.

When I first arrived at the dojo, I noticed several things. One, there were roughly 40 other students in the room. Two, I saw Chris Bradford in the flesh, which rocked my world, because I remember watching his cartoon show, “Chris Bradford’s 2 Ruff Krew”, when I was 7 years old. Three, there was another man, who stood side by side with Bradford when we started our lessons. That man was Oroku Saki and he was, without a doubt, the most influential person in my life, but I’m getting a little ahead of myself.

When the training first started, I didn’t think much of it. It was your standard, average martial arts class. We did basic things like punches, kicks, forms, and takedowns. Nothing special, nothing too difficult. To be honest, during the first few classes, I thought the whole thing was going to be a cakewalk. But as the classes continued, it went from a cakewalk to hell on earth. Oroku Saki wanted us to hit harder, move faster, and show ZERO mercy to our opponents. Everything became more intense and the amount of pain I had to endure skyrocketed. It went from scratches to bruises to cuts to broken bones. To say it wasn’t fun would the understatement of the century.

Eventually, I realized why Oroku Saki made the class more difficult. He didn’t watch the class just because he wanted to. He watched the class to see who he can recruit for the Foot Clan, the most powerful ninja clan in the world. After 6 grueling months, I was the last man standing. Everyone else in the class left because they couldn’t handle the pressure. But I did and as a result, Oroku Saki personally inducted me into the Foot Clan. It was one of the proudest moments of my life.

For the next few years, I lived a double life. During the day, I attended school, hung out with friends, played video games, and finished my schoolwork. At night, I wore an all-black outfit with a black mask, red eyes, and a red bandana. Saki supplied me with weapons such as staffs, shurikens, ninjaken (a fancy word for sword), naginata (a staff with a blade attached), nunchaku, and tonfa (the original version of a nightstick). I mastered all these weapons in a short amount of time and as time went on, I quickly rose up the ranks in the Foot Clan. I went from robbing convenience stores to taking out Yakuza members. I was starting to get paid large sums of money in order to eliminate anyone who could be a potential threat to the Foot. Saki was so impressed with my progress that he made me his second-in-command by the time I was 17. I never told my parents about my life as a Foot Solider, because if they knew I was earning thousands of dollars in blood money, they would probably disown me and kick me out of the house.

When I became Saki’s second-in-command, we began to spend more time together. He treated me less like a soldier and more like a family member. Whenever we were along doing private training sessions, he told what was going on in his personal life. He talked about how his marriage to Tang Shen was disintegrating and his theory that his best friend, Hamato Yoshi, may be responsible for this. He described how much he loved her and that she rarely returned his love. While most people would think he was doing some type of emotional manipulation on me, he wasn’t. He was speaking from the heart. He truly loved her and the fact that she was taking his love for granted, made me feel sorry for him. From then on out, Saki became my mentor and closest friend.

By the time I was 19, I was done with high school and I was free to participate in all Foot Clan activities. The Foot Clan started to grow at a rapid rate and new members were being inducted on a weekly basis. Any opposition against the Foot was shrinking more and more by the day. Everything was going great.

Until something terrible happened.

It was a late September night when it happened. I was busy cleaning weapons, while everyone else was doing their own thing. Saki told everyone he was going to be gone for a few hours to handle some personal business. We didn’t think much of it and we went on with whatever we were doing. Everything was peaceful and quiet when out of the blue, Saki burst through the entrance of Foot headquarters. His clothes were covered in soot and his face was severely burned. He then collapsed to the floor and everyone immediately rushed to his aid.

“SAKI!!! WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?!?” I yelled as I was panicking.

Saki looked at me and gave me a small smile before saying, “I got my revenge.”

At first, I didn’t know what he meant until I saw what he held in his arms. A child. A child that was clearly a newborn. I wanted to say something, but the words couldn’t come out of my mouth. The only thing that was on my mind was to get Saki some immediate medical attention. Eventually, Bradford called an ambulance, and Saki was taken directly to the hospital. Bradford looked after the child, while Saki was getting medical treatment.

After a few days, Saki was cleared from the hospital and he returned to lead the Foot Clan. The burns on his face healed, but the scars would last forever. When he came back to the Foot, he wanted to have a conversation with me in private. I wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted to talk about, but I agreed to the conversation. He took me to his private room and showed me a display of a helmet.

“Do you know what this is?” asked Saki.

“It’s the Kuro Kabuto, sir.” I responded.

“Correct. It is an ancient relic and a primary symbol for the Foot. It was created 1,500 years ago by the founder of the Foot, Koga Takuza. He forged it by using the tokens of his defeated enemies, creating a helmet that was stronger than steel. It was passed on through many generations until it was given to me. I vowed to protect it with my life and I have kept it here ever since.” said Saki.

“Why are you telling me this, sir?” I asked.

“Because from here on out, I will be adopting a new persona. The old Oroku Saki died that night in the fire. But like a phoenix rising from the ashes, I am reborn. I am resurrected. I am revived. From now on, you and everyone in the Foot will refer to me as The Shredder, preferably Master Shredder.” said Saki.

I nodded and bowed before I left the room. Once I was out of the room, I let everyone know about Saki’s new change. While most took it seriously, Bradford laughed it off and thought it was rather silly.

“The Shredder? Sounds less like a ninja and more like a cheese grater. What’s he going to do, scratch me to death?” Bradford mocked.

“You disrespect me again and I’ll cut your tongue out.” Shredder said in a cold, unforgiving voice.

Everyone looked at Shredder and saw his new look for the first time. Shredder wore chrome plate armor on his chest, shoulders, arms, and lower legs over a maroon outfit with a dark blue cape hanging over his back. He now wore the Kuro Kabuto, which hid his horribly scarred face from everyone. I didn’t say it out loud, but in my head, I thought Shredder’s new persona was fantastic. He looked intimidating, menacing, threatening, frightening, sinister, and all-around fear-inducing. While some members of the Foot were terrified by Shredder’s new look, I thought it was fucking awesome.

“And that goes for everyone in this room. From now on, you will refer to me as The Shredder or Master Shredder. Anyone who shows disrespect towards me will face severe consequences. Do I make myself clear?” said Shredder.

Everyone in the room replied with, “Yes, Master Shredder.”

“Good. Now, the endgame I have for the Foot Clan is to turn it into the most powerful crime syndicate on the planet. However, there is one thing holding us back from reaching this goal. More specifically, there is one person who is preventing us from reaching this goal. For the time being, everyone in the Foot Clan has one objective and one objective only. Kill Hamato Yoshi.” said Shredder.


	2. Shredder's Backstory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: This chapter will introduce John’s love interest. It will also revolve around the attempted assassination of Hamato Yoshi. Warning: I’m changing the backstory of Hamato Yoshi and Oroku Saki’s rivalry. Enjoy.

After Shredder gave his short speech, there were so many questions going through my head. Why did he want Hamato Yoshi dead? What on earth did Hamato Yoshi do to Shredder? Was he the one who started the fire that burned Shredder's face? Did Tang Shen had anything to do with this? Why was Shredder holding a newborn baby? Was that baby his or someone else's?

I couldn't let any of these questions sit around for much longer, so I asked Shredder if we could have another private conversation. Shredder agreed and we went inside his private room again to talk.

"Master Shredder, may I ask you a question regarding your speech?" I asked.

Shredder was silent for a few seconds, until he said, "Proceed."

I thought about my words, before asking, "Why do you want Hamato Yoshi dead?"

"You want me to tell you the entire story?" asked Shredder.

"Yes, Master Shredder." I responded.

"Very well. When I was a small child, I was an orphan, just like you. My birth parents were killed in a raid by the Hamato Clan and as a result of their raid, my original home was decimated. Although I didn't understand what was going on at the time, I sat near my deceased parents and cried, because it was the only thing I could do. After a few minutes of crying, a man came up to me and decided to adopt me as his son. That man was the father of Hamato Yoshi." said Shredder.

"So, you and Yoshi were raised as brothers?" I asked.

"Yes. We were raised as brothers and became not only the best of friends but the greatest of rivals. In both of our minds, everything was a competition. Neither one of us was willing to accept 2nd place. This mindset escalated by the time we were young adults when we both met a beautiful, young woman named Tang Shen. We constantly fought for her affection and as a result, our love and respect for each other slowly turned into jealously and hatred. Eventually, Tang Shen had to decide who she wanted to spend the rest of her life with and she ended up choosing me." said Shredder.

Right before talking about his relationship with Tang Shen, Shredder started to tear up and get a little emotional. It was clear that even mentioning Tang Shen's name brought back some painful memories for Shredder.

"We were married for 8 years. The first 7 years of our marriage were the happiest period of my life. Our love for each other was passionate and equal. I thought our marriage would last until we were both of old age. But I was wrong. Over the past year, cracks were beginning to form in our relationship." said Shredder.

"Can you elaborate on that?" I asked.

"She constantly asked me for some "space" in our relationship. At the time, I didn't think that was a problem. I've heard from many people how marriage can feel claustrophobic at times, so I thought it was normal. But as time went on, we interacted with each other less and less. She rarely returned my affections and the passion in our relationship was gone. I thought it may have been my Foot Clan activities that bothered her, but she previously had no issues about me growing the Foot Clan empire." said Shredder.

"Do you know what exactly caused this disintegration?" I asked.

"I didn't know then, but I eventually figured it out. About 9 months ago, Tang Shen revealed to me her pregnancy and our child would most likely be a girl. I remember being so ecstatic about the news. Besides turning the Foot Clan into a worldwide crime syndicate, being a father was my number one goal in life. I told Yoshi about Tang Shen's pregnancy and I remember how excited he was about being an uncle. And it was just one week ago, that Tang Shen gave birth to our daughter, Karai." said Shredder.

"Congratulations, Master Shredder." I responded.

Shredder was silent for a few seconds before responding with, "As much as I appreciate your compliment, I can't accept it."

"Why not?" I asked.

Shredder sighed before saying, "Because I wasn't the father."

Shredder's answer shocked me to my core. I knew his story would contain some type of twist, but I never expected this. If Shredder wasn't the father, who was? I thought about it for a few seconds, until I realized how obvious the answer was.

"It was Hamato Yoshi." I said out loud.

"Correct. Two hours after Karai's birth, several doctors came up to me and wanted to talk with me in private. This worried me greatly, as I thought they would tell me Karai had a disability, an illness, or a life-threatening disease. Thankfully, they told me she was perfectly healthy, which made me breathe a sigh of relief. But what they said next, changed everything. The doctors ran some DNA tests on Karai and found out that none of my DNA matches up with Karai. I then went up to Tang Shen and demanded her to tell me who the father was. She hesitated to tell me the truth, but eventually, she broke down and told me she slept with Yoshi. Never in my life had I felt so betrayed. My brother, my best friend, had sex with my wife and he did it behind my back." said Shredder.

When Shredder told me this information, it gave me two different emotions. The first emotion was sorrow. I couldn't even imagine going through the pain Shredder went through. Not only did his wife cheat on him, but she cheated on him with his brother. It was hard not to feel sympathetic for him. The second emotion I had was hate. Hatred towards Hamato Yoshi. The fact that Yoshi did this behind Shredder's back and never told him about it, made me wish for his death.

"So, what happened next?" I asked.

"Right after she told me the truth, she cried and begged for me to forgive her. She expected me to let bygones be bygones and blindly love her no matter what. But I couldn't forgive her. I could never forgive her. It was her decision, her choice to have sex with Hamato Yoshi without me knowing. So, I told her I wanted a divorce and took Karai out of her arms. I told her she doesn't deserve to be a mother after what she did. Once I left the hospital with Karai in my arms, there was only one thing on my mind. Find Hamato Yoshi and cut his head off." said Shredder.

"And all of this leads to the fire, correct?" I asked.

"Yes. I drove to Yoshi's house, hoping to find him and end his life. Once I arrived, I kicked his door open and demanded him to come out and face me like a man. When he did come out, he had a sword in his hands and asked me what I was doing. I told him that I knew everything about his affair with Tang Shen and that he was a spineless coward for not coming clean to me. I also told him I got a divorce from Tang Shen and I would raise Karai as my own daughter, that way she would have a father she could be proud of." said Shredder.

"Wow. That's quite harsh." I said.

"I know and before I knew it, we were fighting to the death. We fought for what felt like hours, with neither of us having a significant advantage. During the fight, we managed to knock over several candles, which led to the house catching fire. As the house was burning down, there was a moment where I thought I had the killing blow, but Yoshi grabbed a piece of burning debris and hit me on the right side of my face. That's how I got this scar." Shredder said as he pointed at his face.

"What about Tang Shen?" I asked.

Shredder sighed before continuing, "Near the end of the fight, we were so focused on murdering each other that we didn't hear Tang Shen entering the house. She screamed for both of us to stop, but neither of us was listening. In a moment of desperation, Yoshi grabbed a knife and threw it wildly at me. I managed to dodge it, but…what I didn't know…was that Tang Shen… was right behind me. As soon as I realized it, there was nothing I could do. The knife hit Tang Shen right in the chest and both me and Yoshi could do nothing but look in horror. I grabbed Tang Shen as she fell to the ground and as she died in my arms, she told me to take care of Karai and raise her to be a strong woman. I told her I will and a few seconds later, she was dead." said Shredder with tears in his eyes.

Never in my life did I have such an urge to kill someone. It was bad enough that Yoshi had sex with Tang Shen but murdering her in front of Shredder was the final straw. There was only one thing going through my mind at that moment.

Hamato Yoshi had to die.

"Immediately after she died, all I saw was red. I ended up beating Yoshi to a bloody pulp and leaving him in the burning house. I then went back to the car and calmed down Karai by rocking her back and forth and singing a lullaby. After that, I drove to the Foot Headquarters, crashed through the entrance, and that's when you all saw me in the worst state of my life." said Shredder.

"Master Shredder, after hearing everything you've gone through, I would be honored to take the life of Hamato Yoshi." I said confidently.

"I know you would." said Shredder.

Shredder then put his hand on my shoulder and told me, "John, you are my most valuable student. Throughout all my years in learning ninjutsu, I have never seen anyone progress through the art as fast and proficiently as you. The talent you possess is unmeasurable and it's exactly what I need to turn the Foot Clan into the most feared criminal organization on the planet. That's why I'm putting you on a special assignment to track down Hamato Yoshi and end his pathetic life, once and for all."

I give Shredder a sinister smile and said, "Thank you, Master Shredder."

"I must give you some warnings about your mission before you leave. I've received word from several Foot soldiers that Yoshi has already left Japan and moved to the United States of America. They told me he took a flight to New York City, New York. Since neither of us have ever been to the States, I would suggest doing extensive research on America's history and culture, in order to blend in properly. You also need to learn how to use firearms such as pistols, shotguns, assault rifles, automatic rifles, sniper rifles, etc. As disrespectful as it is to combine guns and ninjutsu, it would be more beneficial for you to use a gun, rather than a blade. And although I know you're going to break this rule, it would best if you don't create strong relationships while you're in America. I don't want any innocent people entering our war with Hamato Yoshi. Understand?" said Shredder.

"Yes, Master Shredder." I answer.

"Good. You will leave here in a few days and as an extra precaution, two Foot soldiers will accompany you on your flight. I'll contact you when I know you've arrived in New York. If you find anything that could be connected to Hamato Yoshi, let me know immediately." said Shredder.

I nodded and left the room. Once I left Shredder's room, the two Foot soldiers that would accompany me on my flight introduced themselves to me. I don't remember their names, but they were nice. And right as I was about to walk out the door and go straight home, Bradford came up to me and told me how much he respected my choice to accept the mission. It was that day I managed to earn the respect of not just Bradford, but the entire Foot clan.

For the next few days, I did exactly what Shredder told me to do. I stayed up for hours researching and studying the overall history of America, I quickly mastered any firearm Shredder could give me, and I even spent some time getting to know the two Foot soldiers better.

Eventually, I packed up all my belongings, gave my parents a goodbye hug, and was off to the airport. When I arrived at the airport, I felt a bit uneasy. I was about to fly to a foreign country in order to kill my master's arch-nemesis. Who wouldn't feel under pressure? But when I saw the two Foot soldiers, the stress of the entire situation went away.

The plane ride to New York was smooth and it went by without a single incident. By the time I got to New York City, I was beyond overwhelmed. The buildings were massive, the lights were bright, and the streets were flooded with people. The only words I could form in my brain at that moment were:

"Holy shit. This is going to be tough."

After leaving the airport, me and my fellow Foot soldiers entered a medium-sized hotel, rented our rooms, and dropped our luggage there. To calm myself down, me and Foot soldiers walked to a local bar. While the Foot soldiers got themselves beer, I just sat in silence at my stool. Did I mention that I've never used drugs or alcohol in my life? Bradford would always make fun of my sobriety, but I didn't care. I would prefer my mind to be clear and not filled with pills and booze. Anyway, while sitting in silence, I noticed a young woman sitting right next to me. She had blonde hair, red lipstick, and wore a very nice dress. I didn't know it then, but she would eventually be the love of my life.

"I like your dress." I said to her.

"Thank you, I appreciate it. I was planning on going to a dance, but plans fell through. My name's Susan. What's yours?" she said as she stuck out her hand to me.

I shook her hand and responded with, "John. John Kasai."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that’s the end of Chapter 2. Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Once again, I apologize about the wait, it took me an age to finish this particular chapter. I know my portrayal of The Shredder may be controversial to some, but I really wanted to do something different with the character. I didn’t want my version of The Shredder to be a full-on villain, because I feel like that’s been done to death in every Ninja Turtles incarnation. Instead, I wanted to give Shredder the tragic hero treatment, similar to Darth Vader. He’s a villain by circumstance, not by choice. Also, I hope you don’t hate me too much for what I did to Splinter/Hamato Yoshi. I just thought it would be interesting to reverse the roles of Shredder and Splinter. Next chapter will be in both Susan and John’s POV and it will finally deal with the assassination of Hamato Yoshi. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now.


	3. Meeting Susan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter will be from both Susan and John's POV's. Also, the attempted assassination of Hamato Yoshi will finally take place. Enjoy.

Susan's POV

Hi! I don't believe we've met yet. My name is Susan and yes, I was the woman that John talked to in the bar. It's crazy to think that having a conversation with him would be the turning point of my life. How could 19-year-old me predict all the crazy shit that would take place over the next 16 years? But I'm getting ahead of myself. (Sigh) I remember that night like it was yesterday and it definitely wasn't one of my finest hours. In fact, the night was looking like a chaotic mess before I met Kasai.

One Hour Earlier

"Susan! Are you dressed yet? The dance starts in an hour!" a middle-aged woman yelled.

Ugh! Great. Just Great. Mom just had to yell when I was just about to put my makeup on. Can tonight get any better?

"I KNOW! GIVE ME A FEW MINUTES, I'M PUTTING ON MY MAKEUP!" I yelled from my room.

After applying the last bit of makeup on my face and putting on a stylish red dress, I made my way downstairs to talk to my parents before walking out the door.

"Susan, you look so beautiful in that dress." my Mom said with tears in her eyes.

"Thanks, Mom." I said with a smile on my face.

I gave my parents a quick hug before leaving the house.

"Hope the night goes well for you and your boyfriend." my Dad said.

"I hope so too. Bye, Dad." I said as I closed the door.

Little did my parents know I was planning on breaking up with my boyfriend, Daniel. Now I know that sounds awful but let me explain. I met Daniel a few months ago when I was in my 2nd semester of college. We first met each other when our Biology teacher paired us up for a lab project. While working together, we went from solely talking about the project to talking about our personal lives. It turns out we shared a lot of interests and eventually we began to develop feelings for each other. And I thought those feelings would last a lifetime and we would get married, had kids, and retired together.

But I was wrong.

Those feelings ended up being temporary and I no longer saw him as someone I would spend the rest of my life with. And although he never said anything, I could tell by the look of his eyes and his body language that he knew we just weren't meant to be together. Neither of us cheated on each other. We never had a single fight. Hell, we never even threw petty insults at each other.

Our relationship was simply never meant to be.

Once I was far enough away from home, I called Daniel on my cell phone and told him to meet me at the building that was hosting "The Big Dance", aka the dance we were supposed to go to. When we did meet up, he was wearing a nice black-and-purple tuxedo with a dark purple tie. Not going to lie, he looked so freaking attractive that night. Too bad it was our last night together as a couple.

"Nice tux. Parents forced you to dress up?" I asked.

"Yeah, I was never a big fan of tuxedos. Nice dress by the way." said Daniel.

"Thanks. My parents wanted me to wear it so freaking bad." I said.

After a few seconds of awkward silence, I realized there was no easy way to tell him our relationship was over. So, I went with a more…blunt approach.

"Daniel, I don't think this relationship is working out between the two of us." I said.

I honestly expected him to get incredibly angry with me and say stuff like, "WHAT THE FUCK?!" or "YOU DIRTY BITCH!". But that didn't happen. Instead, he was calm, civil, and we acted like adults.

"Really? Was it something I did or said?" responded Daniel.

"Of course not, Daniel. You didn't do anything wrong. You're a great human being and a great person to be around. It's just that… I don't see us having a future together." I said.

"Is that what you really think?" asked Daniel.

I sighed before saying, "Yes. Are you mad at me?"

Daniel was silent for about 20 seconds before responding with, "Susan, I could never be mad at you. And honestly, I just didn't see our relationship going any further."

"Wow. Um…okay. So, is it alright if we remain friends?" I asked.

"Yeah, we can still be friends." said Daniel.

"Cool. Now before you leave, can we share one last kiss together?" I asked.

"Definitely." Daniel said as we locked lips one last time. Once we finished, he left.

And that was it. The end of my 1st relationship. While the break-up could've been a whole lot worse, it was still one of the saddest moments in my life. The silver lining was that me and Daniel did remain friends to this very day and neither of us held any grudges about the whole thing.

But now I was stuck.

"What do I do now?" I thought.

I couldn't go to the dance by myself, because not only would people bombard me with questions, but the visual of me pretending to have a good time mere minutes after leaving my boyfriend would be very depressing. Plus, I didn't want to tell my parents about the break-up yet, so I was out of options.

"Well, I guess I could kill some time by going to a local bar or something. What's the worst that can happen?" I thought.

After walking around the area for several minutes, I found a local bar and walked right inside. As I expected, everyone in the bar stopped what they were doing and looked at me. One guy even whistled at me. Ugh. I then found an empty stool and sat right down.

Sitting right beside me was a man I've never seen before. His hair was short and spiky, he wore an all-black outfit, and he sported a nice, thin beard.

"I like your dress." He said.

"Wow, a man who complimented me in a way that was actually genuine and not in a way that said "Hey baby, let me get inside your pants," I thought to myself.

"Thank you, I appreciate it. I was planning on going to a dance, but plans fell through. My name's Susan. What's yours?" I said as I stuck out my hand to him.

He shook it and said, "John. John Kasai."

And that was the beginning of our relationship.

John's POV

"John. John Kasai." I responded to Susan.

"Kasai. That's an interesting name." said Susan.

"Yeah. It means fire in Japanese." I said.

She looked quite surprised and said, "Really? You serious?"

"Dead serious." I responded.

"Not going to lie, that has got to be one of the coolest names I've ever heard." she said.

"Thanks." I said as I could feel my cheeks redden up a little after her compliment.

"Are you new to the area because I've never seen you around here before." she said.

"Yeah, I'm never been to New York before. In fact, I've never been to the United States before today." I said.

I saw her eyes widen at my answer. "Really? You've never been in the United States before today?" she asked.

"Yep." I said.

"Holy shit, you must be stressed out of your mind, especially in a city like this." she said.

"I was, but eventually, I calmed down and a large amount of that stress vanished." I said.

"Well that's good. So where exactly are you from?" she asked.

"Osaka, Japan." I said.

"Japan? Damn, I've always wanted to travel there. And how long have you lived in Japan?" she asked.

"My whole life. Over 19 years. I was adopted by a middle-aged couple after my birth parents died." I said.

"Oh my God, I'm so sorry about your parents. I can't even imagine what it's like to lose my parents." she said.

"It's okay and thank you. My adoptive parents, Harukichi and Mei, raised me quite well." I said.

"So, what exactly led you to move to America?" she asked.

I knew I had to choose my words wisely because I don't think she would respond well if I mentioned how I'm a member of a Japanese ninja clan.

"Business reasons. I'm apart of an international organization, along with my two comrades over there." I said as I pointed to the two Foot soldiers drinking beer.

"But enough about me, I would like to know more about you." I said.

"Are you sure, because my life doesn't even compare to yours." she said.

"Come on. Everyone has a story and not all of them need to be fantastical or epic. But if you don't want to tell me, that's 100% okay. I'm not going to force you." I said.

"Okay, I'll tell you my story. My name is Susan Johnson. I was born on August 8th, 1977 in New York City, New York. My parents are William Johnson and Mary Johnson. I grew up in a middle-class environment, went to several schools, made tons of friends, had high grades, participated in sports, and now I'm currently enrolled in College. And I just broke up with my boyfriend, Daniel, about an hour ago." she told me.

"Damn. That's pretty rough." I said.

"Don't worry, it was a mutual decision. Neither of us thought the relationship was going to work. Plus, we're still friends." she said.

"Well, that's good. It could've ended a lot worse." I said.

"Definitely. Um, it's been really nice talking to you, but I have to head home soon before my parents get suspicious since they don't know about the break-up." she said.

"You didn't tell them about your break-up?" I said.

"They would've flipped the fuck out if I told them right before I was supposed to go to "The Big Dance". Oh and in case you want to talk or hang out or something, here's my phone number." she said as she wrote her phone number down on a nearby napkin.

Right as I accepted the napkin, I wrote down my own phone number on a separate napkin and gave it to her. We both said "Bye" to one another and she left the bar. I couldn't describe it then, but I knew we felt some type of connection with each other. And that connection only grew over the next few months.

For the next several months, we hung out together on a regular basis. We constantly talked on the phone, ate dinner together, went to see some movies, discussed our deepest fears, etc. Our friendship quickly transformed into a romantic relationship. Just 3 months after we met, she asked me one simple question.

"Do want to marry me?"

I didn't know how to respond to that. I've only met this woman 3 months ago and while 3 months is a decent amount of time, it still feels a bit hasty to "settle down". But at the same time, we had a very strong connection to each other and if there was one person I would love to spend the rest of my life with, it would be her. So, I gave her my answer.

"Yes." I said.

Immediately, she became ecstatic and we embraced each other. A few weeks later, we had our wedding. Instead of the wedding being an extravaganza, it was a private ceremony, with only my parents, Susan's parents, a few of Susan's friends, and even Master Shredder showing up. The wedding was exactly what you would expect. I wore a fancy tuxedo, she wore an amazing white dress, we placed rings on our fingers, we said our vows, we kissed, and we lived happily ever after. The end.

Just kidding. That's not the end. Not even close.

What I didn't tell Susan during this time was that I was actively searching for Hamato Yoshi. Unfortunately, I didn't find much success. The first thing I did was check every martial arts building in the city, only to find nothing. Some people may find that to be "stereotypical", but frankly, I don't give a shit. The next thing I did was talk to some local gangs in the area. One of those gangs was a Chinese-American group who called themselves The Purple Dragons. Their leader, Hun, looked like a Bruce Lee impersonator. Although I thought they looked pretty lame, they did have connections to the Foot Clan, so I was willing to work with them in order to find Hamato Yoshi. I thought working with them would make the job easier. Turns out I couldn't've been any more wrong. The Dragons were 100% incompetent, idiotic, and downright pathetic. You couldn't trust these guys to find a can of soup. They were THAT bad.

After dealing with the failure that was the Purple Dragons, I kind of gave up the search for Yoshi, in order to spend more time with my new wife. Especially, since we had a kid on the way. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that. To put it simply, after the whole wedding ceremony was over, me and Susan "got busy" in the bedroom. In other words, we had sex and it was the best sex we ever had.

Anyway, for the next few months, things were relatively peaceful. The summertime was especially quiet. I still remember when me and Susan decided to pick what Summer '97 movies to watch back-to-back. She chose Speed 2: Cruise Control and I chose Batman & Robin. Needless to say, it was one of the worst decisions either of us ever made and we still regret it to this day.

It wasn't until September 29th, 1997, when everything changed.

The day started out relatively normal. Me and Susan bought all the baby supplies we could ever need such as a crib, a stroller, baby bottles, diapers, etc. As much as I was excited about being a father, dealing with dirty diapers and constant crying was not something I was looking forward to. But at the very least, having Susan around to help me will make it a bit more tolerable. But besides the baby stuff, things were pretty calm. At least they were before I got a phone call from an unknown number. I answered the phone and the conversation went something like this.

"Hello?" I said.

"Is this John Kasai? John Kasai from the Foot Clan?" asked the mystery caller.

"Yeah, but who this is and how did you get this number?" I asked.

"That's not important. What is important is what I'm about to tell you right now." said the caller.

"Okay, what do you want to tell me?" I asked.

"We found him." said the caller.

"Found who?" I asked.

"Hamato Yoshi." said the caller.

I was in shock for a few seconds before responding with, "What? Really? Are you sure it's him?"

"100 percent sure. He just entered a pet shop, located a couple of blocks from where you live." said the caller.

"Oh and I suggest you get there quick." the caller said before the line went dead.

"Baby? Who was that?" asked Susan.

"No one important. Listen babe, I'm going out for a bit. It shouldn't take long." I said.

"Can I please come with you? I'm sick of staying in the house all the time." said Susan.

"Babe, your stomach looks like it's about ready to pop. The last thing I want is for your water to break while we're in public. I really don't need that embarrassment." I said.

"Ugh. Fine. I'll stay inside and be a bored, miserable blob." Susan said with an annoyed, yet sarcastic tone.

I laughed at her response before telling her, "Don't worry. I'll be back very soon. And if anything happens, you either call me or one of your friends, got it?"

"Got it. Love you." said Susan.

I gave her a small smile as I responded with, "Love you too."

After those words left my mouth, I walked out of our apartment and headed straight to the pet shop.

Once I arrived at the location, I climbed to a rooftop of one of the nearby buildings, to avoid being seen. When I made it to the top, I noticed a rather large wooden box near the edge of the roof, with a note sticking out of it. I took the note and read it. All it said was…

"Use this to get the job done."- Anonymous.

Right next to the Anonymous name was a small Foot Clan symbol.

Logically, the next thing I did was open the box to see what was inside. And what I saw did not disappoint. It was a fully loaded sniper rifle. The perfect weapon to use in a situation like this. I took the rifle out of the box, set it down on the ground, and positioned it where it directly faced the pet store. I then got down on my stomach, looked directly in the sniper scope, and waited for Hamato Yoshi to come out of the store.

It took approximately 5 minutes before I saw Hamato Yoshi leave the store and in his hands was a container that housed 4 baby turtles.

"Why the hell would he buy himself turtles?" I thought to myself.

While paying close attention to Yoshi's movements, I heard noises coming from a nearby headset and when I put it on, Master Shredder's voice was on the other line.

"Are you in position?" asked Shredder.

"Yes, Master Shredder. My eye is currently on the target." I said.

"Good. Now whatever you do, don't let him see or hear you. If he has the smallest feeling that he's being watched, the mission will be jeopardized. There is zero room for error. Understand?" said Shredder.

"Yes, Master Shredder." I said quietly.

Just as I was about to pull the trigger and end Hamato Yoshi's life, I noticed a group of men, who all looked the exact same, exchanging a canister of some weird, green liquid.

"Maybe it's a new drug on the black market?" I thought to myself.

Right when the men were about to make some type of agreement, they heard a noise and saw Hamato Yoshi staring at them. Classic wrong time, wrong place scenario.

"Master Shredder, I might have run into a situation." I said.

"What type of situation?" Shredder asked.

"Right as I was about to shoot Yoshi, I saw a group of similar-looking men exchanging some strange, green substance. Yoshi accidentally gave away his position and is now in a staredown with the men." I said.

"What do the men look like?" asked Shredder.

"They all have black hair, black sunglasses, and black suits." I said.

"Hmmm. Are they FBI or CIA agents?" asked Shredder.

"I don't think so. They look way too shady to be agents." I said.

And before I could say another word, a fight ensued with Yoshi and the men.

"Sir?" I asked.

"What?" asked Shredder.

"A fight broke out between Yoshi and the men." I said.

"Shit. Just take the shot." said Shredder.

"Take the shot? Are you sure, because I could let those men do my job for me." I said.

"TAKE THE SHOT NOW BEFORE HE CAN ESCAPE!" yelled Shredder.

The last thing I wanted was a pissed-off Master Shredder, so without hesitation, I pulled the trigger and the bullet went flying. I didn't know if it was going to hit one of the men, Yoshi, or some unlucky bystander. Instead, the bullet hit a green canister that was launched into the air and as a result, the canister shattered on impact. The green substance landed on Yoshi, who screamed in pain and agony when it got on his body. As he screamed, one of the men knocked him out with a strange-looking gun and threw his unconscious body into the sewers, via a manhole. In addition, the container with the 4 turtles was thrown into the same manhole. Considering that Yoshi was covered in the green substance, there was a high chance those 4 turtles were covered in the substance too.

"Well, I took the shot." I said.

"And?" asked Shredder.

"It ended up hitting a green canister and as a result, the green liquid ended up on Yoshi's body. The way Yoshi reacted to it made it look and sound like acid." I said.

"Is he still alive?" asked Shredder.

"Not sure. He was knocked out by one of the strange men and thrown into the sewers. If the green liquid on his body happens to be some form of acid, he should be dead by now." I said.

"Hmmm, then your mission is finished. Congratulations, John. I knew I could trust you to get the job done." said Shredder.

Hearing Master Shredder praise me for accomplishing the mission almost brought tears of happiness, but I managed to control my emotions.

"Thank you, Master Shredder." I said.

Right before Shredder could say anything else, my phone starting buzzing. Curious as to who was calling me, I pulled it out of my pocket and answered it.

"Hello?" I asked.

"WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?!" a woman yelled into the phone, making my ears bleed.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. PLEASE CALM DOWN. I don't even know who you are." I responded.

"It's Betty. One of Susan's good friends." said Betty.

"One of Susan's friends? Wait, did something happen to Susan?" I asked as I started to panic.

"Yes. SHE WENT INTO LABOR." said Betty.

Those 4 simple words made my heart stop.

"WHAT?! WHEN?!" I yelled.

"About 10 minutes ago. So, I suggest you GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE IF YOU WANT TO SEE THE BIRTH OF YOUR CHILD!" Betty said before hanging up.

"Master Shredder…my wife went into labor." I said as it felt like my soul left my body.

"Go. Be with her. I'll send you your reward in the next few days." said Shredder.

"Thank you, Master Shredder." I said before taking off the headset and running straight to the hospital.

Thanks to my ninja and parkour training, it took me less than 10 minutes to arrive at the hospital. I bust through the hospital doors and asked the receptionist where my wife was. When she told me, I ran up the stairs and through the hallways as fast as I could.

Eventually, I made it to the right room and stood by my wife's side.

"You made it." Susan said with an exhausted look on her face.

"I know and I'm sorry. I'm sorry for not coming here sooner. I'm sorry for not being there when your water broke. I'm sorry for not calling you earlier about it. I'm sorry f…" I said before Susan interrupted me.

"John, it's okay and I forgive you. Neither of us knew this would happen today. But what's important is that you're here now and I can FINALLY push our baby out." said Susan.

"Okay ma'am, we need you to perform one last big push." a doctor said.

Susan screamed in pure agony until she heard the cries of her newly born child.

"The baby is out and it's a girl." said one of the doctors in the room.

"It's a girl? Can I please hold her?" asked Susan.

A doctor cut the baby's umbilical cord, wrapped it in a blanket, and handed it over to Susan, who put the baby in her arms.

"Congrats honey. You did it. Our daughter has come into the world." I said with tears in my eyes.

"She's perfect." Susan said as we both looked at our newly born daughter's face.

"What should we name her?" I asked.

"I was thinking of something that starts with a K. That way her initials can be K.K." said Susan.

"Um, how about Kimberly?" I asked.

Susan thought about it for a second before saying, "No."

"Kayla?" I asked.

"No." said Susan.

"Katherine?" I asked.

"No." said Susan.

"Karen?" I asked.

"God no." said Susan.

"Ummm, what about Kate?" I asked.

"Kate. I like that. Yeah, I really like that. Kate Kasai. Has a nice ring to it. It's settled then, her name will be Kate." said Susan.

And that was the day my daughter and greatest achievement, Kate Kasai, was born.

Little did I know on the same day Kate was born, 4 baby turtles started their journey that would eventually lead them to me and the results would change all of our lives permanently.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's the end of Chapter 3. Jesus, this took forever to write and it's by far and away the lengthiest thing I have ever written. So, I apologize for the ridiculously long wait. Thankfully, the next chapter won't be as long as this one, as it will mainly focus on John going back to the Foot Clan after a 2 year sabbatical and meeting all of the new members. And don't worry, the turtles will eventually show up properly in this story. It won't be until Chapter 5 when we get to the beginning of the 2012 series. Other than that, I hope you have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.


	4. Rejoining The Foot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: The Foot Clan roster in this story will be very similar to the 2012 series, with a few exceptions. First, this version of Bebop and Rocksteady will not resemble their 2012 counterparts, although their human names will remain the same. Instead, they will have the design of the 1987 series mixed with the attitude of the IDW comics. Second, Baxter Stockman will remain human and not mutate into Stockman-Fly. Third, each new character introduced (Bebop, Rocksteady, Stockman, Xever, Tiger Claw) will already be an established member of the Foot Clan. Enjoy.

John's POV

A few days after Kate was born, Master Shredder lived up to his word and sent me my reward for ridding the world of Hamato Yoshi. And it was more than I ever would've expected.

He sent me a briefcase and inside it was one million dollars.

Let me repeat that. Master Shredder sent me ONE MILLION DOLLARS. IN CASH.

He also told me I was free to take a 2-year vacation since there was nothing really going on in the crime world at the moment. Even though I stopped working for the Foot Clan full-time, I was still in contact with Shredder and Bradford, that way I was still in the loop and I knew what was going on.

As for me and Susan, thanks to the money I earned from working with the Foot Clan, she finished college, earned her bachelor's degree, got a high-paying job and we moved to a nice apartment in Manhattan. I did meet her parents and while Susan's mom liked me, her dad despised me. He said I was a bad influence and I would ruin her life and a bunch of other crap. To put it simply, me and her dad do not have the best relationship. But other than that, everything was good.

However, those 2 years went by rather quickly and me being a stay-at-home dad wasn't exactly how I wanted to spend my days. Now don't get me wrong, I love being a dad and love spending time with my wife and daughter. But at the same time, I missed the Foot Clan, I missed Shredder, I missed Bradford, I missed the whole ninja lifestyle. The last thing I wanted was to be a boring ass parent, so after a long talk with Susan, I was able to convince her to let me rejoin the Foot Clan.

I called Shredder on my phone to tell him the news.

"Hello?" answered Shredder.

"Master Shredder, it's me." I said.

"John. It's been quite a while since we've talked. Why do you call?" asked Shredder.

"I'm ready to rejoin the Foot Clan." I said.

"Excellent. I'm pleased to hear that. Now I must warn you, the Foot Clan has gone through some…changes since you've been on vacation." said Shredder.

"What type of changes?" I asked.

"Let's just say you'll be seeing new faces and of those faces, some of them aren't exactly human." said Shredder.

I was confused by his answer, so I said, "So, you hired some animals, like dogs or wolves?"

"It's more complicated than that. I'll explain more when you get to Foot headquarters. When should I expect you to arrive?" said Shredder.

"3 to 4 days from now." I said.

"Excellent. I'll see you then. It was great to talk to you again." said Shredder.

"Same to you, Master Shredder. Have a good evening." I said before hanging up the phone.

"Some of the faces aren't exactly human? The hell does that mean?" I thought to myself.

Three Days Later

After a stupidly long flight, I finally made it back to Japan, my original home. I took a train and rode on a highway bus until I arrived at my destination. The Foot Clan headquarters. And when I walked up to the building, I could already tell that things have changed drastically since I've last been there. The building was larger and it had a more modern and expensive presentation.

If there was one thing you could say about Shredder, it's that the dude was fucking loaded with cash.

As I walked through the front door, I took a moment to look at the place, and to say I was impressed would be the biggest understatement in history. Foot Clan banners were everywhere, there were multiple weapons racks, roughly 50 intern Foot Soldiers were in the middle of practice, and I even saw a lab filled with tons of scientific equipment. It was definitely an upgrade from the previous headquarters.

"John? Is that you?" I heard a familiar voice say. I turned around and saw my old buddy and Hollywood dickhead, Chris Bradford.

"Chris! It's so nice to see you again." I said as we gave each other a bro hug.

"Same to you. Still sober?" said Bradford.

"Yep. Still an asshole?" I fired back.

"Always." Bradford said with a smile.

"So, what exactly has changed around here?" I asked.

"A lot. The Foot Clan has gotten so powerful that many of the gangs who were once against us are now on our side. Shredder now has connections with multiple criminal organizations in China, Brazil, Russia, Italy, and a bunch of other countries. They realized if they tried to fight us, they would get annihilated." said Bradford.

"So, in other words, they either had to adapt or perish." I said.

"Exactly." Master Shredder said as he showed up out of nowhere, which surprised both me and Bradford.

"Master Shredder." I quickly said before giving him a proper bow.

He nodded before we gave each other a hug. Shredder usually never showed affection, as it would clash with his badass persona, but I was one of the few exceptions to that rule.

"It's been way too long." I said.

"I know. The Foot Clan has not felt the same without you." said Shredder.

"Now, about you telling me that some of the new members of the Foot aren't exactly human, what do you mean by that?" I said.

"Yes, I believe it's time I showed you." said Shredder.

I followed the Shredder into an empty dojo, where I saw 5 unfamiliar faces standing in a line.

"Here are the 5 new members I recruited after you left." said Shredder.

I walked up to the new members and while the first two guys looked normal, the next three threw me completely off guard. One looked like a humanoid tiger, another looked like a humanoid warthog, and the last one looked like a humanoid rhinoceros. Unlike normal animals, they were wearing clothes and carrying around weapons.

Shredder was right, they weren't exactly human.

The only thing I could say at that moment was: "Holy shit."

"What? You've never seen a walking, talking animal before?" asked the humanoid warthog.

I slowly turned to Shredder and politely asked him, "Master Shredder, can you please explain to me WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON HERE?!"

"Umm, excuse me, but I believe I can help answer your question." said the first person in the line.

I immediately walked up to the person and asked, "And you are?"

"Baxter. Baxter Stockman. I run the science division in the Foot Clan." said Stockman.

"I'm going to assume the lab I saw when I entered the building is yours, correct?" I said.

"Precisely." said Stockman.

"You must have a lot of free time on your hands." I said in a joking manner.

"You could say that." said Stockman.

"Now, about my question regarding…uh, whatever those…um, beings are." I said.

"Right, well the answer is very simple. They are mutants." said Stockman.

"Mutants? Like X-Men or something?" I responded.

"No, it's nothing like X-Men because one, that's a comic book, and two, the mutations in X-Men are purely genetic." said Stockman.

"So, if it's not genetic, then how were they mutated?" I asked.

"They were mutated with a green chemical substance known as mutagen." said Stockman.

"Green chemical substance? Hold on a minute, I think I've seen it before. Isn't it usually in a canister?" I asked.

"Yes, it usually is. Why?" said Stockman.

"I remember seeing it with some shady-looking men, who ended up fighting Hamato Yoshi." I said.

"Well, lucky for us, several of our business partners acquired several crates of mutagen from the States about a year ago." said Stockman.

"YOU ACTUALLY HAVE IT?" I asked.

"Yep and I've been studying and modifying it ever since." said Stockman.

After talking with Stockman, I walked up to the 2nd person in line. Unlike Stockman, who looked a stereotypical nerd with his glasses and pink sweater, this guy had a cooler, more street-like look to him.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"Xever. Xever Montes." he said.

"I see you got a thick Brazilian accent." I said.

"Yes, I am of Afro-Brazilian descent and I became one of the most notorious thieves in the entire country. Until…" Xever said before pausing.

"Until what?" I asked.

"Until he was caught red-handed and sent to prison. And if I didn't witness his skillset and bail him out, he would've rot there for the rest of his life." Shredder finished for Xever.

"Good to know." I said before moving on to the mutated warthog who spoke earlier.

Not going to lie, I was a little bit nervous when I walked up to the warthog. The warthog sported a purple mohawk, purple shades, and a silver septum nose ring, along with a red vest, black pants, and red and white sneakers. I was still relatively unsure about mutants. I mean I only found out about their existence a few minutes ago. Could you really blame me?

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Bebop." he said.

"Bebop? I'm assuming that's not your real name and it's just an alias." I said.

"Yeah, it's my new name." said Bebop.

"Do you have a real name?" I asked.

"We'd rather not talk about our past names." the mutated rhino answered for Bebop.

I looked at the rhino and he was wearing a yellow tank top, army camouflage pants, and brown boots. He also had a large and very sharp-looking horn ripping out of his nose.

"And what's your alias?" I asked.

"Rocksteady." the rhino answered with a thick Russian accent.

"Judging by your accent, I'm going to assume you're Russian, correct?" I said.

"Correct. I was born in Mother Russia." said Rocksteady.

"It seems you and Bebop know each other. You guys friends?" I asked.

"We're more than friends. We're partners." said Rocksteady.

"When you say partners, do you mean you're BFFs, or are you romantic partners? Because if you're the latter, I don't mind it at all." I asked.

"Both. We're gay and we don't care what anybody says." said Bebop.

"Oh. Well, good for you. It's good that you're both confident in telling people that you're gay. Most people would just hide in the closet for the rest of their days." I said.

"So, how were you two mutated in the first place, if you don't mind me asking." I asked.

"Master Shredder wanted volunteers for an experiment, in order to see what would happen if you mixed animal DNA with mutagen. Me and Rock signed up, Baxter shot us with a dose, and before we knew it, we became the mutants we are today." said Bebop.

I talked with them for a little while longer, before moving to the 3rd and final mutant on the Foot Clan roster. A mutant tiger who had the look of a bounty hunter and who wasn't afraid to show off his weapons.

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Takeshi, but I go by the name Tiger Claw." he said.

"Sounds fitting. So how did you become a mutant?" I asked.

"When I was a small boy, me and my sister Alopex came across a portal while we were on the playground. Being young and naïve, we entered the portal, only to be mutated and experimented on by robotic alien creatures. After that, we got back to Earth, were disowned by our family, ran away to the circus, left the circus to become assassins, and eventually Shredder hired me to join the Foot." said Tiger Claw.

"Damn. What happened to your sister?" I asked.

"We split apart, had a violent fight, she cut off my tail, and we've never spoken since." said Tiger Claw.

The only thing I could say to that was "Jesus."

"Tiger Claw has built quite a reputation for his work and has become the most feared assassin in all of Asia. And because of his credentials, he is now my second-in-command." said Shredder.

"Wait a minute, I was your second-in-command. Now that I'm back in the Clan, shouldn't I retain that position rather than being replaced by Mr. Tony the Tiger over there?" I said.

While Tiger Claw was super pissed, everybody else either laughed or snickered at my insult. Even Shredder chuckled a bit.

"Look, I know you're upset, but you have to understand that you've been gone for 2 years. 2 years without constant training makes you sloppy, uncoordinated, and a liability. And the last thing I want in my Clan is a liability. Understand?" said Shredder.

"Yes, Master Shredder." I responded.

"Good. Now if you want to be my second-in-command again, you'll have to earn it. But until that day comes, I'm assigning you to work with Bebop and Rocksteady. I believe working in a team will do you some good. Everyone is dismissed." said Shredder.

Everyone left the dojo, except for me, Bebop, and Rocksteady. Once I knew Shredder left the room, I punched a nearby wall in anger and frustration over being demoted.

"God, this is BULLSHIT." I yelled.

"Look, I know you're angry, but you need to know that when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade." said Rocksteady.

I soon calmed down and said, "I know. As they say, every cloud has a silver lining. And you two seem like pretty alright guys, so maybe this could be good." I said.

"It will be good, because we'll be the most dominant and feared trio the world will ever see." said Bebop.

"Hell yeah. That's what I like to hear." I said.

"Oh, there's one more thing you should know about us." said Rocksteady.

"And what's that?" I asked.

"Um, me and Beebs have nudist tendencies." said Rocksteady.

"Meaning we're not the biggest fan of clothes, so we like to walk around in either our undies or in the nude." said Bebop.

Foolish me thought they would say they had allergies or a pet or cocaine or ANYTHING other than they liked being in their birthday suits. Now I wasn't going to judge them for wanting to be naked, because I'm not that type of person. But at the same time, the visual of mutant animal dicks wasn't exactly something I wanted to see.

"Ummm, that's fine with me…I guess." I said awkwardly.

"Cool, because we're ditching the clothes." said Rocksteady.

At that particular moment, Bebop took off his vest, pants, and sneakers, while Rocksteady removed his tank top, camo pants, and boots, leaving the two in only their white jockstraps. They then called in some poor entry-level Foot Clan soldiers to take their clothes back to their room.

"Does Shredder know about these…tendencies?" I asked.

"Oh yeah, he's fine with it. We train in nothing but our jockstraps all the time. He's just not the biggest fan of us being naked in front of him. He tolerates it, but it's obvious he's not comfortable with open nudity." said Bebop.

"Okay, well I'm going to go talk with Shredder about my schedule, so I'll see you guys later." I said while quickly leaving the room.

After talking with Shredder, I was told that due to my status as a husband and a father, he made me an official part-time member. This meant I was allowed certain weeks off to be with my family or for other things such as birthdays and holidays. As someone who was also raising a child, the last thing Shredder wanted was for me to neglect my daughter. Plus, I still got paid during those off-weeks, so that was a positive.

In my head, I thought being with Bebop and Rocksteady on a constant basis would be a disaster. It's not that they were bad guys, it's just that they goofed around a little too much and like Shredder, I wasn't the most comfortable with open nudity. But when we were on missions, fighting rival gang members, I could see why Shredder hired them. They were brutal, vicious, and showed zero mercy to their enemies. They used their incredible brute strength to break bones, throw people like rag dolls, and destroy rival gang hideouts. I remember when Rocksteady broke one dude's spine by lifting the poor soul up in the air and slamming him back-first on his knee.

It also helped that we ended up developing great chemistry with each other, performing a variety of double and triple-team moves to any punk who wanted to fight us. They even helped me alter my fighting style into a more street-fighting/WWE wrestling style rather than solely ninjitsu.

After a while, Bebop and Rocksteady had built up enough trust with me that they were willing to tell me about their real names and their past lives. Bebop and Rocksteady's real names were Anton Zeck and Ivan Steranko and BOY, their pasts made my past look like a Disney movie. Anton grew up in the projects in New York City, with a drug-addicted mother who had a revolving door of boyfriends. Ivan, on the other hand, was born in Moscow, Russia before moving to the States at the age of 9, with his abusive, racist, homophobic father. Both of their childhoods were hell, as Anton was constantly bullied by his classmates for being poor, while Ivan was forced by his father to treat anyone who didn't look like him like garbage and if he didn't, he'd get beaten. By the time they were 17, neither of them could take it anymore and both ran away from home, before eventually running into each other. After a few years of working with several small gangs, they met the Shredder, who invited them to join the Foot Clan. They accepted, became official members of the Clan, volunteered to be mutants, and since there wasn't going to be a long line of ladies who were willing to be with a rhino and warthog, they pretty much said "Fuck it" and became a couple.

And they ended up becoming my two closest friends.

Five years went by without anything significant happening, until one unfortunate day where I almost lost my life. I was on a mission with Bebop, Rocksteady, Tiger Claw, and a few other Foot Clan soldiers and our goal was to find and eliminate a rogue member of the Foot. He was apparently a spy sent by the Yakuza, but that's not really important. What matters is how this mission ended. I ran through numerous hallways, shooting any and all resistance, before finding the spy's hideout spot.

Now, I thought this would've been extremely easy. I find him, kill him, taunt his dead body, and that's it. I would move on and everything would be fine.

But no. Turns out, the bastard rigged the room with explosives and before I knew it, his thumb pressed a button, a deafening noise wrecked my ears, and everything went black. I found out later that Bebop and Rocksteady found my unconscious body and brought me back to the Foot HQ to get medical treatment, so there's another reason why they're my favorite bros.

But still, I was unconscious, I suffered a multitude of injuries, and I was very close to the not-so-sweet embrace of death.

I was out of it for 4 days and it looked like I wasn't going to make it. So, Shredder made a tough, risky, and extremely dangerous decision in order to save my life. I hope you're ready for this. He managed to convince Baxter Stockman to INJECT MUTAGEN INTO MY BLOODSTREAM, as a way to speed up the healing process and bring me back into consciousness. Now, there are a million things that can go wrong by doing something this reckless. I could've been turned into a gelatinous blob or a mindless bloodthirsty monster or something even more horrific.

Thankfully, this didn't happen. In fact, something even better happened.

Approximately 20 seconds after the mutagen was injected into my blood, I woke up in a panic. My heart rate was through the roof, I had a tsunami of questions running through my mind, I ripped all the heart monitor crap off my chest, and I fell out of bed.

And what happened next was something that nobody saw coming. Not even me.

As I was panicking, I suddenly disappeared, and then not one second later, I reappeared in a different spot in the room. This happened a few times before Shredder managed to calm me down. It turned out the mutagen gave me FUCKING TELEPORTATION POWERS. Not only that, it gave me the power of flight, enhanced my physical and mental abilities to superhuman levels, made me immune to every disease and poison known to man, and turned me into the most dangerous human in the history of the planet.

In simpler terms, I became a mutant and it was the best thing to ever happen to me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's the end of Chapter 4. It was a little longer than I expected, but I'm still satisfied with the results. The reason why I gave Bebop and Rocksteady nudist tendencies is because in the Archie Comics, the two were sent a Dimension X world, where they decided to embrace their animal selves and stop wearing clothes. I liked the idea enough that I wanted to incorporate it into the story, plus the visual of John being embarrassed by Bebop and Rocksteady's nude antics really amused me. Now, why did I made Bebop and Rocksteady gay, you may ask? Well, it was based on the 2016 Out of the Shadows movie, where those two had more romantic chemistry than April and Casey EVER did and that's A COLD HARD FACT. Anyway, the next chapter will go over John's increased role in the Foot Clan after his mutation and the timeline will finally reach the beginning of the 2012 series, which means one thing. The Ninja Turtles will show up and play a major role in the story. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.


	5. The Foot Invade New York

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: This will be the chapter where the timeline of the story will match up with the 2012 series. However, while certain episodes and characters will be mentioned, a majority of events that took place in the 2012 series will either be cut or changed. One final note, the turtles, Splinter, April, Casey, and Karai will all make their proper debuts in this chapter. Enjoy.

John's POV

After my mutation, life got a lot more interesting. I quickly reclaimed my role as Shredder's second-in-command after showing off my new teamwork skills. Not only that, I was given more power and influence in the Clan, which eventually led to me and Shredder becoming co-leaders of the Foot Clan. When it came to operations, Shredder would handle the business side, while I handled the physical side. I had to train new members of Foot Clan, which was weird at first because I never thought I had the qualities to be a great teacher. But to my surprise, a majority of the trainees genuinely liked me and my style of training, which I would personally describe as a mix between Mr. Miyagi and Professor Snape.

Whenever I wasn't training newbies, I spent a lot of my time simply hanging out with Bebop and Rocksteady. Right after my mutation, they convinced me to "start over" and create a new persona. After many failed potential nicknames, I ended up calling myself "The X-Factor Of The Foot Clan" due to how integral I was to the Clan's success. I chose a bold red X as my personal logo and incorporated it into my brand new outfit, which consisted of a black and red metal face mask, a black sleeveless shirt with a large red X on the front, and a flag on the back that was a mix of the American and Japanese flags, black pants with red stripes on the sides, and some good old-fashioned black kick pads over my black shoes. If you haven't noticed by now, my two favorite colors are red and black. I even got some tattoos, a large stylized red dragon on my back and an alternate Foot Clan logo on my right shoulder.

At the same time, I started to develop a stronger bond with Chris Bradford. We spent a large amount of time training together, singing a ton of heavy metal and rock music (namely System of a Down, Slipknot, Disturbed, etc.), and became close friends. He even revealed to me that he had a wife and a daughter, which shocked the hell out of me since I always assumed he was the single, Hollywood bachelor type.

In the 8 years since my mutation, my powers have only gotten stronger and many people in the crime world were either amazed or terrified of me. Some even compared me to God, which I personally don't support. Besides, I'm pretty sure God hates me after all the horrible shit I've done in the Clan. Oh yeah, you're probably wondering what terrible things I did in those 8 years. I don't want to go into too much detail, but it involves a lot of death, torture, and pain. But I will tell you is one of my favorite activities was being a fake friend to scumbag millionaires and billionaires. I acted like I gave a shit about them, lured them into doing business with the Clan, and once they signed the dotted line, they simultaneously signed their own death sentence. Me, Bebop, Rocksteady, Bradford, and Tiger Claw would brutalize them with bats, sledgehammers, and barbed wire, put them out of their misery, and took all their money. I especially liked going after pedophiles and rapists, because it gave me great satisfaction to remove those sick fucks from the Earth. I went from a multi-millionaire to a multi-billionaire in a short amount of time. And before you call me a greedy, selfish bastard, I gave large portions of my money away to friends, family, charities, school funding, city funding, state funding, and other positive things, so I'm anything but selfish.

With the money I earned from my Foot Clan activities, I bought a large unused skyscraper, once held by a millionaire I got rid of and decided to make it my main home. I also decided to buy an alternative home and I ended up buying a semi-large forest house located near a lake. I mostly use this home as a way to escape the chaotic atmosphere of city life.

As for my family, my marriage with Susan stayed strong, even after I told her about my work in the Foot Clan and my mutation. The fact that she didn't leave my ass after telling her those things showed me that I picked the perfect woman to be with. Watching my daughter Kate grow up into a young woman had its' positives and its' negatives. She was academically gifted, making straight A's in all her classes, was well-liked by all her classmates, had a great personality, and wasn't too embarrassed when I gave her hugs or kisses. But at the same time, I was not prepared for the day when she had her first period. The visual still haunts me. Also, she watched way too much goddamn Disney Channel for her own good. It got so bad that even I started humming to lyrics to "Bet On It" from High School Musical 2 on random occasions.

September 30th, 2012

It's now the year 2012. Me and Susan are now 35 years old, which is just another step closer to being "middle-aged". Kate turned 15 recently and we just threw her a kick-ass birthday party to celebrate. She's currently a Freshman at Roosevelt High School, along with her two best friends April O'Neil and Casey Jones. April was a bit shy but very intelligent and while Casey may be a bit rough around the edges, he has a good heart and is very protective of April and Kate. The trio have been friends since the 2nd grade and me and Susan have treated April and Casey like they were official members of the family. Casey came to Kate's party, but for some strange reason, April was a no-show. I assumed she might have had some scheduling conflicts, so I wasn't too concerned about it.

Anyway, a day after the party, I got a phone call from Shredder. I thought the timing was a bit odd, but I answered the phone without question.

"Master Shredder?" I asked.

"Hello John. Before I tell you anything, I just wanted to wish Kate a happy belated birthday." said Shredder.

"Thank you, Shredder. She would greatly appreciate the birthday wish, even if it is a day late. Now, what exactly is this about? Did something happen while I was away?" I asked.

"Yes. Remember Hamato Yoshi?" asked Shredder.

"Yeah, I took him out 15 years ago. Why?" I replied.

"Turns out he's still alive." said Shredder.

After hearing those words, my blood began to boil. Scum like Hamato Yoshi did not deserve to live.

"WHAT?! NO! NO, THIS…THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING! THIS CAN'T BE REAL! YOU HAVE TO BE FUCKING JOKING!" I screamed into the phone.

"I assure you I am not in a joking mood. Even worse, it seems that my former brother is raising a ninja army of his own." said Shredder.

"Great. Fucking fantastic. And just after my daughter's birthday too." I responded.

"Because of this, the Foot Clan will be relocating to New York City for the foreseeable future." said Shredder.

Shredder's words caused my anger to turn into both happiness and confusion.

"Um, what?" I asked dumbly.

"We will be relocating to New York City in roughly 2 days. Your job is to find us a building we can use as our headquarters and MAKE SURE IT DOESN'T DRAW ANY ATTENTION." said Shredder.

I decided to troll Shredder a little bit by replying with, "Soooo…I guess that means I can't pick a strip club?"

"WHAT?! GOD NO! JUST PICK SOMEPLACE DECENT!" yelled Shredder.

"Okay, relax. I was just kidding. I'll find you a decent place." I said.

"Good, see you in 2 days." said Shredder before hanging up.

"Honey, who was that?" asked Susan.

"Shredder." I said.

"What does he want now?" she asked.

"He told me that the Foot Clan would be relocating to New York City in approximately 2 days." I said.

"Honey, that's great! That means you don't have to travel so much anymore. Did he give a reason why?" she said.

"Yeah, a guy who I thought was dead 15 years ago is unfortunately still alive. Not only that, he's apparently raising his own little ninja army." I said.

"Well that fucking sucks." she said.

"And now Shredder wants me to find a building in the city that we can use as our new Headquarters." I said.

"Uh-huh. And WHERE exactly do you plan on moving an entire crime syndicate?" she asked.

I then looked around the living room with a curious look in my eyes. As soon as Susan saw that look, she shut me down immediately.

"No." she said.

"There is a lot of space in this building." I said.

"No." she repeated.

"It has an appropriate color-scheme." I said.

"NO." she said once again.

"Come on Susan, how bad could it possibly be?" I asked.

"JOHN, this is our home, or at least our main home. The last thing I want is for our home to become a clubhouse for criminals." said Susan.

I sighed before saying, "Fine, I'll pick someplace else. Somewhere where no one can suspect a thing."

"You're not relocating at my parent's house." said Susan.

"Dammit. How do you know what I'm thinking?" I said before walking into the home elevator.

"Instincts. Oh, don't forget, Kate wants you to look at her English essay before she turns it in." said Susan.

"I know. Trust me, it won't take long." I said as I pressed the 1st-floor button on the elevator control panel.

"That's what you said 15 years ago when my water broke." said Susan.

"God, you're still on that. I thought you would be over it by now." I said as the door began to close.

"Love you." she said, blowing me a kiss.

"Love you too." I said as the door closed.

Once I left the tower, I got in my car and began to drive around the area, searching for options. Technically, I don't need a car because of my flight abilities, but I thought it would be good to keep a low profile. After searching for over half an hour, I finally found a building that was satisfactory. It was an old, abandoned cathedral that had plenty of room to fill an entire ninja clan inside. It was perfect.

Two Days Later

Well, today's the day. The Foot Clan were coming to New York City to raise hell and kick ass. Besides me, Susan's, and Kate's birthdays, it was the most exciting day of the year for me. Shredder told me to meet him at the John F. Kennedy International Airport. Rather than driving for roughly an hour, I made life easier for myself by simply teleporting there. I teleported into the men's restroom and I stealthily made my way to Terminal 2, where he would meet me.

After waiting for about 15 minutes, I suddenly saw many people screaming in terror and running away in fear. Curious, I walked towards the chaos and at the end of the terminal, I saw Shredder walking with the rest of the Clan. I loved how Bebop, Rocksteady, and Tiger Claw walked into the public area with a "No Fucks Given" attitude, even as everyone screamed at the sight of them. Right next to Shredder was his daughter Karai, who was now 16 years old and a fully trained kunoichi (fancy word for female ninja). For some reason, she never liked me and always displayed a passive-aggressive attitude towards me. I've never understood it.

"Master Shredder! Welcome to America!" I said to Shredder before we gave each other a hug.

"How was the plane ride?" I asked.

"Tolerable…until Bebop and Rocksteady destroyed the toilet on the plane." said Shredder.

"Not our fault that the sushi you gave us was bad." said Bebop.

"Bebop! Rocksteady! My two favorite bros! It's been way too long!" I said before we hugged each other.

"Agreed. We should definitely do something together, once we settle in "The Big Apple", as they call it here." said Rocksteady.

I looked at Karai before saying, "Hello Karai."

"Hello John." she said with an annoyed tone.

"Bradford, Stockman, Xever, Tiger Claw. Nice to see all of you again." I said.

"Same to you John." said Bradford with a smile on his face.

"Okay, well, welcome to the United States of America, a country filled with nothing but positivity and peace." I said sarcastically.

Karai noticed my sarcasm by responding with, "You're kidding?"

"Yes, I'm kidding, Karai. This country is filled to the brim with the stupidest, sickest, most immoral people I have ever seen…which means we'll fit right in." I said.

"Hardy har har." said Karai.

"You found the building yet?" asked Shredder.

"Yes, I have. And I think you're going to like it. Plus, I've already sent you the coordinates." I said.

"Excellent. I've sent a limo driver to pick us up in a few minutes." said Shredder.

"Good, because I was not going to teleport all of you to the building at once. That would seriously drain my power." I said.

After a few minutes of waiting, the limo arrived and we all made our way inside.

"Now, since everyone in the airport wanted to be SO FREAKING RUDE, I'll be your unofficial New York City tour guide, since I'm the only one who knows how everything works around here." I said after I closed the car door.

One hour of driving later, we made it to the old cathedral and Shredder looked pleased with my choice.

"It's large, dark, atmospheric, and no one would know that we're here. Excellent choice, John." said Shredder.

"Thank you, Master. How will it take to set everything up?" I asked.

"A few days. Until then, you are free to go home." said Shredder.

"Well, alright then." I said as I walked away.

"John." said Shredder.

"Yeah?" I responded.

"You don't need to call me Master anymore. From now on, you can call me Saki, if you'd like." said Shredder.

"Okay. Good night, Saki." I said before teleporting back to my house.

One Week Later

After the new Foot Clan Headquarters were set up, things began to slow down considerably. It turns out tracking down Hamato Yoshi and his little ninja army was harder than anyone imagined. Hell, for the longest time, none of us knew what they even looked like. According to several Foot soldiers, the army consisted of 4 ninjas, they only showed up at night, stayed in the shadows, and before you can get a good look at them, they would knock your ass out. Another Foot soldier told me that they sounded quite young, possibly the same age as Karai.

It wasn't until Bradford lured one of them in, via a social media website, that we learned what these ninjas truly looked like.

"They're turtles. The "Teenage Mutant Ninja variety" the stupid one told me." said Bradford.

"That's it? That's the "army" Yoshi has been building up for 15 years? Ha. Give me a fucking break." I said.

"As childish and immature as these turtles are, I will admit they are very skilled warriors." said Bradford.

"So was I when I was their age and that was before I got my mutant powers. Taking them down should be nothing." I said confidently.

"Still, I wouldn't take them lightly. The blue one is the most skilled out of all of them, the purple one is a genius, the red one has serious anger issues, and the orange one is both stupid and unpredictable." said Bradford.

"Well, none of them have ever dealt with someone like me. Someone who can break them physically. Someone who can break them spiritually. SOMEONE WHO WILL MAKE THEM WISH THEY DIED IN SHIT INFESTED WATERS WHEN THEY WERE BORN." I said with absolute fury.

"John, what's up with your eyes?" asked Bradford with concern on his face.

"What?" I responded before finding a nearby mirror and looking into my eyes. Chris was right, something was wrong. The whites in my eyes (sclera to be more accurate) have turned black and my eye color (iris) went from blue to red. They looked straight-up demonic.

"Shit. Probably a side effect from the mutagen. It must happen when I'm really pissed off." I said.

I shut my eyes for a few seconds and magically, they turned back into their original color.

"Weird." I said to no one in particular.

Five Days Later

Susan and Kate decided to go on a trip to Japan, while I chose to stay in New York to help out the Foot Clan. Meaning, I was all alone for 6 days. Not a whole lot of people know this, but I'm not the biggest fan of being alone. I hate the overwhelming sound of silence and I feel more comfortable when I'm around someone. So, in what I thought would be a risky decision, I asked Bebop and Rocksteady if they wanted to stay over at my forest house for a few days. I even told them they could walk around naked if they wanted to. Unsurprisingly, they said yes.

They packed their belongings before I grabbed their hands and teleported them to the forest house. They were immediately impressed by the scenery and how nice the house looked. Once we entered the house, I showed them their room and they quickly unpacked their stuff. The two then explored the house, before spotting a hot tub on the porch.

"Dude, you didn't tell us you got a hot tub!" said Bebop.

"I didn't think it was that important! Plus, I barely use it anyway!" I yelled from another room.

"You mind if we use it?" asked Rocksteady.

"Sure! Knock yourselves out!" I said.

"Sweet!" said Bebop.

By the time I got to the porch, Bebop and Rocksteady were butt-ass naked, relaxing in the hot water. I then noticed their clothes on the ground, so I quickly put their clothes in their room before going back to the porch. I grabbed a nearby chair, faced it towards the two mutants, and sat in it backwards.

"I see it didn't take you too long to go au naturel." I said.

"Yeah, there's no one around, so why stay clothed?" said Rocksteady.

"Fair point." I said.

"So, I have a question. Why did you invite us here in the first place?" asked Bebop.

"Because you two are my favorite bros. And now that you're in New York, we can hang out more often." I said.

"We know that but why really?" asked Rocksteady.

I sighed before telling them the truth.

"I invited you guys over, because Susan and Kate are on a trip to Japan, and…I hate being alone. Loneliness is my worst fear and I'm far more comfortable when I'm around other people. That's why I invited you two over." I said.

"Oh. Well, the last thing either of us want for you is to feel lonely. Trust us, we've both felt loneliness before we met each other and it is not pleasant." said Bebop.

"Yeah, what Beebs said. If you ever feel lonely, just give us a call." said Rocksteady.

"Thanks, guys. I'm glad I have friends like you." I said.

Right after saying that, Rocksteady let out a massive fart in the hot tub, completely killing the moment and all the plants nearby.

"Oh my God, dude." I said while pinching my nose.

"Please, that's nothing. I'll do you one better." said Bebop.

"Please don't." I begged, but my begging fell on deaf ears as Bebop let out an equally loud and disgusting fart in the hot tub. Both mutants laughed, while I tried to hold my breath from the god-awful stench.

"Note to self: Never use the hot tub ever again." I thought to myself.

A few hours later, Bebop and Rocksteady were sitting on my large, reinforced sofa, playing Resident Evil 6 on my Xbox 360 and being immensely disappointed by it.

"Dude, this game is wack. 5 was better than this." said Bebop.

"Nonsense, 4 was the best one." said Rocksteady.

I interjected their debate by saying, "I still think 2 is the best. If they remade that game with today's technology, it would be fucking flawless. Besides, put your clothes on, it's time to go."

"Go? Go where?" asked Bebop.

"Out. Out the house. We need to do something, other than laying around inside." I said.

"We could…go to an arcade or something." said Rocksteady.

"Alright, then it's settled. To the arcade, we go." I said.

Once Bebop and Rocksteady put their clothes back on, I teleported us to the middle of an empty street.

"The arcade is just up the road. Now, if anyone attempts to take a picture of you or attack you, knock them out. DON'T KILL THEM. Got it?" I said.

"Yeah." Bebop and Rocksteady said simultaneously.

"Cool." I said.

We then entered the empty arcade and most of the employees looked at the three of us with absolute fear and ran away like there was no tomorrow. I gave Bebop, Rocksteady, and myself $100 in tokens and for the next hour, we made that arcade our bitch. Bebop and Rocksteady were racking up points in House Of The Dead and Basketball, while I dominated Dance Dance Revolution and even got a new worldwide high score.

After playing games for over an hour, the three of us decided to order some pizza. I personally ordered some pineapple pizza, proving I'm a true villain. Both Bebop and Rocksteady ordered themselves Meat Lover's pizzas, which had me both concerned and disgusted.

"Guys, do you realize what you're eating?" I asked with dread in my voice.

"Pepperoni, sausage, bacon, ham. Why?" Bebop responded.

"Bebop. You're a mutant warthog and you're eating pepperoni, sausage, bacon, and ham." I said.

"Yeah. So?" said Bebop.

"So? IT'S FUCKING CANNIBALISM. It's just as bad as me eating a pizza with human meat on it." I said.

"Whatever, man. I liked this pizza before I was a mutant warthog and it's not going to change now that I am mutant warthog." said Bebop.

"It doesn't change the fact that it's STILL DISGUSTING. And Rocksteady, rhinos were never meant to be carnivores." I said.

"No matter what you say, you're not going to stop me from eating this pizza. Besides, it's better than that abomination you're eating." said Rocksteady.

"Oh my God, WHY DO SO MANY PEOPLE HAVE A PROBLEM WITH PINEAPPLE PIZZA?!" I yelled in frustration.

"Because it's not natural." said Bebop.

"What the both of you are doing ISN'T NATURAL. Hell, by definition, NONE OF US ARE NATURAL. Our very existence is a giant middle finger to science, God, and humanity." I said.

A few seconds of silence went by before Rocksteady said, "I still think pineapple on pizza is gross."

"You know what? I give up. Let's just eat our disgusting pizzas in peace." I said.

After eating our pizza, collecting our tickets, and winning a PS3 as a prize (which I gave to Bebop and Rocksteady since I already had one), we left the arcade and walked down the empty streets of Manhattan. Bebop and Rocksteady were talking to each other about the potential of a PS4, while I was busy listening to some N.W.A tracks, because I had good taste in music. Nothing was happening, until someone jumped out of an alley and said the following:

"End of the line crooks! I know you stole that PS3. Now face the fury of the Pulverizer!"

Me, Bebop, and Rocksteady looked at each other with utter confusion. We then turned around and saw a hilariously pathetic sight. An overweight teen who wore a red bandana around his eyes and wore a green, turtle-like outfit looked at us and expected us to be intimated by his presence.

The three of us looked at each other before we laughed our asses off at the sight of this dumb teen. The fact that he thought his outfit was acceptable was embarrassing and it made us laugh even more.

"Wait, wait, wait. I'm sorry, but what was your name again?" I asked mockingly.

"The Pulverizer." he said.

"Hahaha. Buddy, the only thing that's getting pulverized right now is your fucking dignity. Besides, we didn't steal that PS3. We won it in an arcade." I said.

"Well…you scared all those employees away." said the Pulverizer.

"Not my fault they were a bunch of scared pussies." I said.

"It's still wrong to terrorize innocent civilians and now it's time for me to teach you a lesson." said the Pulverizer.

"Really? You and what army? There are three of us and one of you. DO THE FUCKING MATH. Actually, don't try to do it. You're probably one of those kids who skip class to eat at Krispy Kreme or Dunkin Donuts. Yeah, I bet you're a real disappointment at home and your parents are embarrassed to call you their son. And honestly, I wouldn't blame them for disowning your sorry ass. You think going around like you're fucking Batman is really cool, right? Fighting crime, saving lives, getting girls. It all sounds great, but here's the problem…NONE OF THAT SHIT IS REAL! ME, BEBOP, AND ROCKSTEADY ARE REAL AS IT GETS AND WE COULD TEAR YOU APART, LIMB FROM LIMB IF WE WANTED TO! SO, IF I WERE YOU, I WOULD START RUNNING BACK HOME BEFORE YOU END UP IN A BODYBAG!" I screamed as my eyes turned red and black.

To my surprise, the Pulverizer had some balls and punched me right in the face.

I looked at him with a smile on my face. I chuckled before delivering a brutal punch to his face, knocking him out cold.

"I'll admit it. He had some guts. Too bad he couldn't take a punch." I said.

Rocksteady picked up the Pulverizer's unconscious body and threw him over his shoulder. Bebop managed to find his phone in one of his boots and we discovered his name, which was Timothy, and his address. Once we found his address and dumped his body in his bedroom, we teleported back to the forest house.

Bebop and Rocksteady quickly took off their clothes, before telling me that they were going straight to bed. I personally thought it was a little early to go to bed, but I wasn't going to judge.

A few hours later, I suddenly remembered to tell Bebop and Rocksteady about our strategy for fighting the turtles. I walked up to their room and after hearing some weird noises, I decided to open the door, which was the biggest mistake of my life.

When I opened the door, I was greeted with the visual of Rocksteady "inserting himself" into Bebop, in what many people like to call "Doggy Style". Now, this isn't the first time I've seen fellow Foot Clan members doing sexual things. I once saw Tiger Claw watching furry porn where everyone wore various animal costumes. That was an interesting sight. But seeing Bebop and Rocksteady having graphic sex, made me freeze up and stare at them.

They quickly noticed my wide-eyed stare and got annoyed with each other.

"Whoops. We forgot the lock the door. Good job, idiot." Rocksteady said as he smacked Bebop in the head.

"Owww. Dude, you just as guilty as me. You're the one who wanted to get straight to the sex." said Bebop as he elbowed Rocksteady in the stomach.

"Um guys, sorry I interrupted your "private" time, but tomorrow morning, we're going to talk about dealing with the 4 Hamato turtles. So, you two continue with your lovemaking, while I go and bleach my brain." I said, quickly leaving the room.

The Next Morning

I sat at the kitchen table, eating breakfast and desperately trying to erase the image of Bebop and Rocksteady "doing it" from my mind. Although I don't have a problem with them having sex, since they're a couple and they have every right to show their love to one another, it doesn't mean I wanted to see it in person.

Rocksteady was the first to come to the kitchen, stretching out his arms and rubbing his slightly overweight belly. He sat down in the chair to the right of me and put his feet up on the table.

"So, how was your night?" I asked.

"Wonderful. We had all types of fun." said Rocksteady.

"Good. Good." I said as I thankfully let the conservation die before it got any worse.

Bebop came out shortly afterward, sat down in the chair to the left of me, and put his feet up on the table. So, I was now sitting in between two giant, naked mutants, whose bare feet were uncomfortably close to my face. Just the way I wanted to start the morning.

"So, are we going to talk about the turtles?" asked Bebop.

"Yes, Bebop. We need to figure out how we're going to get rid of them and Hamato Yoshi." I said.

"We could find their home and destroy it. That way they have no choice but to fight us and lose miserably." said Rocksteady.

"Okay, but we don't even know where their home is. From what I've heard from Foot Soldiers, they appear at night and disappear during the day." said Bebop.

"They could live with the homeless. Doubt they would live in an apartment. What do you think John?" said Rocksteady.

"Well, they sure as shit wouldn't live in the city. So, if they can't live above ground, then maybe they live underground." I said.

"Underground? Like in the sewers and stuff?" asked Bebop.

"Yeah. Come on dude, where else would walking, talking turtles live? A zoo? A lab? A mansion owned by a rich guy who's into some fucked up shit?" I said.

"You got a point. But how about instead of finding the turtles, we find Hamato Yoshi first." said Bebop.

"Yeah, if we bring Yoshi to Shredder, then those turtles will have to come out of those crappy sewers and face us." said Rocksteady.

"Hmmm. Not a bad idea, guys. I'll tell Shredder about it on the phone." I said.

"Good and now that we're done with this meeting, we're going outside to sunbathe." said Bebop as he and Rocksteady got up out of their chairs and went outside.

Once they were gone, I gave Saki a call and told him about the idea. He seemed pleased with it and he assigned me to be the one to bring Yoshi in. This made me so elated because, after 15 long years, I now had the chance to finally finish the job. I could finally eliminate Hamato Yoshi, once and for all. He also wanted me, Bebop, and Rocksteady to go back to the Foot Clan HQ immediately.

I walked to the back and saw Bebop and Rocksteady laying down on the grass, with their junk exposed to the world. This gave me a wicked idea. I walked back into the house, grabbed two cups of crushed ice, walked back outside, stood right in front of Bebop and Rocksteady, and poured the crushed ice directly on their crotches.

"What the hell dude?!" said Bebop.

"What gives?!" said Rocksteady.

"Get dressed. Shredder wants us back at the Foot HQ ASAP." I said as they were tending to their frozen genitalia.

They looked at each other, before Bebop said, "Must be the plan we were talking about."

"Definitely." said Rocksteady.

Later That Night

The plan was finalized. I would go down in the sewers, find Hamato Yoshi, bring him to HQ, let Saki deal with him, and then me, Bebop, and Rocksteady would finish off Yoshi's students and any other allies they had.

If we succeeded, the Hamato Clan would be terminated.

At 11 pm, I was fully prepared and about to enter the sewers. Before I did, I told Bebop and Rocksteady that if we accomplished our goal, I would give them $10 million dollars each, in order to make sure they would be on their A-game.

After that, I found a nearby manhole cover, pulled it off, climbed down into the sewers, and began my search for Hamato Yoshi.

For the next 20 minutes, I was roaming through the sewers, trying to find some type of clue that would lead me in the right direction. It also didn't help that the sewers smelled like shit because of course they would. It wasn't until I heard a voice, a voice that sounded human, that I finally had an idea of where to go. I walked closer towards the voice, which soon turned into multiple voices, and eventually, I found an abandoned subway tunnel.

"This must be it." I said to myself.

From there, things got easier because one, the god-awful smell was gone and two, the entrance was very easy to spot. Like a ninja, I silently jumped over the subway turnstiles and made my way to what looked like the turtle's living space. It had several arcade machines, a TV, a tire swing, a moat with clean water, and plenty of space to sit down and relax. Honestly, their home looked kind of nice, way better than some of the apartments I've seen in New York. I looked around some more and found a kitchen, a lab, a bathroom (thank God), a dojo, and several bedrooms.

While searching for Yoshi, I noticed a picture on the kitchen counter. I looked at it and it showed the 4 turtles and a giant rat. I looked closer and saw the Hamato Clan symbol on the rat's robe. It then dawned on me.

"The mutagen turned Hamato Yoshi into a giant rat? What?" I said out loud.

Suddenly, I heard footsteps and quickly hid behind the counter. Thanks to my years of training, I mastered the art of invisibility and knew how to stealthily move around an environment. From my current position, I took a peek at the front of the kitchen and saw a rather short mutant turtle wearing an orange mask. "The Stupid One" as Bradford called him. And for some bizarre reason, the turtle was also wearing white briefs.

"Strange." I thought to myself.

The orange turtle was making himself a midnight snack, a PB&J sandwich to be more precise. Everything was silent until the turtle started talking.

"Just what I need. No aliens. No Foot ninjas. No Shredder. Just me and my sandwich." he said before taking a bite out of the sandwich. "I just wish my bros could just chill out a bit. But NO, they keep telling me "Mikey, do better", "Mikey, focus", "Mikey, grow up", "Mikey, stop being weird", "Mikey, stop being stupid". It's like they want to criticize me for just existing. Maybe when this whole war is over, things will get better. But who knows if we'll even be alive by then." he said before leaving the kitchen.

Once I knew he was gone, I decided to check some of the bedrooms, just to see how the other turtles acted when they weren't on the battlefield.

I snuck around and saw a door that had the sign "Knock First. That Means You, Mikey."

"Man, this family must really dislike Mikey." I thought to myself.

I opened the door ever so slightly and saw a tall, purple-masked mutant turtle on a computer, typing in what looked like scientific notes. The turtle even had a gap in his teeth. I looked closer and saw something I didn't expect. A picture of April O'Neil.

"April knows about these guys? Is that why Kate complains how April has been flaking on her for the past few weeks? Does…does Kate know about this?" I said internally.

I silenced my inner thoughts when the purple-masked turtle picked up a weird phone that was shaped like a turtle shell. I listened closely when he dialed a number and held the phone to his face as it rang.

"Come on Donnie. Don't chicken out. Don't be a coward. Just ask her out on a date. How hard can it be?" the turtle said to himself.

"Hello. Oh hey, April. Listen, I know it's late, but I wanted to ask you something. Um, do you want to hang out sometime? Yeah, just me and you. I…I guess you can call it a date. Wait, really? You want to go on a date with me? Next Saturday? Oh, okay. I'll see you then. Bye." the turtle said before hanging up the phone.

The turtle, who referred to himself as Donnie, became ecstatic and started joyfully jumping around in his room. Just seeing him so happy warmed my heart.

The next door I saw had some stereotypical teenager signs on it, like "Enter At Your Own Risk", "Stay Out", and "Don't Touch My Drum Set!"

"Must be going through a phase." I said to myself quietly.

Before I could enter, the doorknob started to turn. In a moment of panic, I quickly found another room to hide in, which happened to be the bathroom. And just as things couldn't get any worse, the bathroom doorknob began to turn.

"Damnit." I said to myself.

I ended up hiding in the shower, which was not one of my proudest moments.

The bathroom door opened and a red-masked mutant turtle entered. He stretched his arms before closing the door, which meant I was temporarily trapped in the bathroom. He walked towards the toilet, opened the lid, and began to take a piss. The sound of relief coming from the turtle made everything worse.

"Why did I agree to do this?" I asked myself internally.

Once the turtle finished peeing, he flushed the toilet and said, "And that is the last time I let Casey pick the drinks."

"Wait…Casey? Casey's in on this too?" I said internally.

While washing his hands, the turtle said, "Ugh, I bet Splinter going to get on my ass again for hanging with Casey. Why doesn't he get that Casey is the only person who truly understands me? He's the only one who knows me, the real me. But no, all Sensei wants to do is tell me "Raphael, spend more time with your brothers". I guess I'm not allowed to have a life outside of the sewers." Raphael, as he called himself, then left the bathroom shortly afterward.

"Wow. Yoshi sounds like a terrible father. He can't shelter his kids for the rest of their lives. That's not healthy at all." I said to myself.

After I left the bathroom, I walked towards the dojo and saw Hamato Yoshi, the giant, mutant rat, meditating in the middle of the dojo.

"There you are, you fuck." I said with venom.

Before I could strike, I heard footsteps heading my way. I quickly hid in a dark corner, near the entrance of the dojo. I saw a blue-masked mutant turtle enter the dojo and I moved closer towards the entrance to hear the conversation.

"Um, Sensei?" the blue-masked turtle said with nervousness in his voice.

"Yes, Leonardo?" Yoshi replied.

"Can I ask you a question?" asked Leonardo.

"Yes, my son. What do you want to ask me?" said Yoshi.

"It's about the Shredder. Do you think he's telling the truth when he talks about you?" Leonardo asked.

"What does he say about me?" asked Yoshi.

"According to Karai, you were the one who killed Tang Shen and you're the one who started this conflict. Is any of that true, or is Shredder just lying?" said Leonardo.

"Nonsense. Everything the Shredder says is a lie. He's the one who became jealous over my relationship with Tang Shen. He's the one who killed her in cold blood. He's the one who took my daughter away from me." said Yoshi.

At that moment, I wanted to strangle Yoshi so fucking badly. THE BASTARD WAS LYING TO HIS KIDS AND MANIPULATING THEM INTO TO THINKING THAT SAKI WAS THE ENEMY AND YOSHI WAS THE FUCKING VICTIM. It honestly made me want to vomit.

"Don't believe anything the Shredder says. His only goal in life is to destroy our family. Understand?" said Yoshi.

"Yes, Sensei." said Leonardo. Although Leonardo said yes, it looked like he said it out of obligation and not because he meant it.

As soon as Leonardo left the dojo and Hamato Yoshi turned around, that's when I struck.

I slowly walked up to Yoshi and before he even react, I strangled him from behind, wrapping my arm around his throat. Yoshi tried to fight out of it, but I only made the hold tighter.

Suddenly, Leonardo, who must have heard Yoshi's struggle, ran back into the dojo and saw me strangling his master.

"Step away from Sensei." he said menacingly as he held out two katanas.

Knowing I was caught, I immediately teleported myself and Yoshi out of the dojo and into the Shredder's throne room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that’s the end of Chapter 5. The next chapter will be a direct continuation of the events of this chapter, where Shredder finally gets his confrontation with Yoshi and John, Bebop, and Rocksteady fight the turtles. I know this chapter was ridiculously long (the longest thing I’ve ever written), but it was necessary for the story, because there was a lot to go through. Also, how did you like my portrayal of the turtles? I made their personalities similar to their 2012 personas, with some slight tweaks, such as Donnie having the guts to ask out April, Mikey being frustrated with how his brothers treat him, and Raph wanting to have a closer relationship with Casey. Leo is more or less the same, at least at this part of the story. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.


	6. End Of An Era

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter will be from the POV of Shredder and John. Warning: This is going to be the darkest and most violent chapter of the whole story. Death, torture, humiliation, broken bones, and blood loss will all be featured. Things are about to get real uncomfortable, so I'm warning you now. Enjoy.

Shredder's POV

"Master Shredder, should we go out and search for John? He should've been back by now." said Bradford.

"He could've gotten ambushed or something." said Bebop.

"Maybe we should skip to the final phase of the plan." said Tiger Claw.

"SILENCE!" I yelled as my patience reached its breaking point.

I knew it would take some time for John to find Hamato Yoshi. Like myself, Yoshi was a master at the art of ninjutsu, so attempting to search for him would be a challenge. Especially with those 4 turtles, he's raised since he came to New York. But I did not expect John to spend over 40 minutes finding the piece of filth that murdered the love of my life.

"Father, it's been over 40 minutes. We can't delay the rest of the plan any longer." Karai said with an annoyed tone.

"Patience, Karai. I trust John to return with Hamato Yoshi. Failure is the last thing on his mind." I said.

Mere seconds later, John teleported into the throne room, with his arms wrapped around a giant rat's throat. The rat looked unconscious and John roughly pushed the abnormally large rodent to the ground.

"Sorry about the wait. I took some time exploring Yoshi's new home. It's quite spacious." said John.

"What is that…thing you brought here to me?" I asked.

"You mean this garbage eating fuck? Oh, how can I be so rude? Ninjas and mutants, may I present to you the disgrace of ninjutsu…HAMATO YOSHI!" he said as he pointed to the rat's body.

"You're joking. There's no way that's him." said Karai.

"Oh, it's him alright. He has the Hamato Clan symbol printed right on his robe." John said with confidence as he turned over the rat's body, showing everyone the Hamato Clan symbol.

"He must have gotten mutated into a rat when I tried to shoot him 15 years ago." said John.

"It's definitely a fitting mutation, considering his character." I said.

The mutated rat I once called my brother, opened his eyes and looked at his surroundings. He looked at me, John, and finally Karai.

"Miwa?" Yoshi said with confusion.

I smacked Yoshi across the face with my gauntlet and grabbed him by his robe.

"Her name is Karai. You will never refer to her as Miwa again." I said to Yoshi before delivering a roundhouse kick to the back of his head.

I then looked at John and told him, "Soften him up for me."

John gave me a sadistic smile as he stood behind Yoshi, wrapped his arms around Yoshi's stomach, lifted him off the ground, and dropped him on his shoulders and upper back. John referred to this move as a German suplex, a move made famous in American and Japanese wrestling. John performed this move 15 times on Yoshi, as a "tribute" to the 15 years of waiting for this very moment. After John gave the final German suplex, I told him and the rest of the Foot Clan to leave the room and let me finish Hamato Yoshi myself.

Once everyone left the room, I stared at Yoshi, who was struggling to stand on his feet. Yoshi eventually got up off the ground and he stood face-to-face with me.

"15 years. It took me 15 years to find you." I said with a low voice.

"Saki, we don't have to fight. We can talk this out." said Yoshi.

"Talk this out? You didn't feel like talking things out when YOU IMPREGNATED MY WIFE." I yelled.

"I know. I know what I did was wrong and dishonorable. But don't you think I've been through enough? Look at me! I'm a mutated rat. I've lived underground for the past 15 years. My sons and I will never be accepted by society. You've already won. So, leave my family alone." said Yoshi.

"Yoshi, don't you realize? I am your family. Those turtles you raised are technically my nephews. Now, as their non-biological uncle, I might let your sons live. Who knows? They might be better in my care than yours." I said.

"If you lay one hand on my sons, I'll…" said Yoshi.

"You'll do what? Scratch me with your disgusting rat hands and feet? You've already done enough damage to my face that night in the fire." I said.

"Don't you dare mention that night." said Yoshi.

"Why not? It was the night you destroyed everything. The night you MURDERED Tang Shen, the love of MY life. We were supposed to live a long, happy life together. But you didn't want that to happen. No, you wanted Tang Shen all to yourself." I said as I kicked Yoshi in the stomach.

"Please, Saki. I'm…I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Yoshi said pathetically.

At that moment, my anger boiled over. I took off my helmet and threw it on the ground.

"YOU THINK SAYING SORRY WILL BRING MY WIFE BACK?!" I screamed before giving Yoshi a strong punch to the right side of his face.

"YOU THINK SAYING SORRY IS GOING TO ERASE THE 15 YEARS OF HELL I'VE WENT THROUGH?!" I screamed before giving Yoshi an even stronger punch to the left side of his face.

"YOU THINK SAYING SORRY WILL SAVE YOUR PATHETIC LIFE?!" I screamed before smashing my knee into Yoshi's face, knocking him back down on the floor.

Right before I was about to deliver the final blow, I stopped myself.

I knew deep down that killing Yoshi wouldn't change anything. The pain of Tang Shen's death would still exist. Instead, I would humiliate Yoshi by treating him like the animal he mutated into.

"I could kill you right now. I could slice your throat, pierce your heart with my blade, cut your head off. But that would be too easy and it would never erase the pain. So, instead of treating you like a man, I'm going to treat you like the filthy rodent you truly are." I said with venom in my voice.

I tore off Yoshi's Hamato Clan robe, leaving him in nothing but his white fundoshi. I spat on the robe, before throwing it to the ground and stomping on it.

"Now as far I know, rats don't wear ANY clothing." I said before tearing off his fundoshi with one of my blades. Yoshi was now naked, vulnerable, and defenseless, which is exactly how I wanted it. Yoshi wasn't going to be treated like a human being anymore, especially after he had sex with my wife.

"Rats also DON'T speak." I said as I gave Yoshi a punch to his throat, causing him to cough violently.

"And they don't stand on two legs." I said before delivering a stomp kick to both of Yoshi's kneecaps, causing him to drop to his knees and scream in pain.

I walked towards a weapons rack and searched for a weapon I could use against Yoshi. After looking for a few seconds, I found what I was looking for. A leather belt. I grabbed the belt off the rack and walked back to Yoshi's beaten body.

"Normally, I'm against animal cruelty. But you'll be the exception." I said right before delivering the first of many whips to Yoshi's body.

John's POV

For the past 10 or so minutes, me and the rest of the Foot Clan patiently sat in the training room, waiting for Saki to finish off Yoshi.

The atmosphere in the room was uncomfortable, to say the least and it got even more uncomfortable when we heard Saki beating Yoshi with a belt. Many of the Foot Soldiers cringed at the sound the belt made when it struck Yoshi.

To ease the tension, I decided to strike up a conversation with some of the newer recruits.

"So, how are you guys doing?" I asked.

"Good." said one of the recruits as the rest nodded in unison.

"How do you like working for the Foot Clan so far?" I asked.

"It's definitely not what I expected. Never thought I had to deal with walking, talking turtles." another recruit said.

"Well, welcome to the crazy world of the Foot Clan." I said.

"Hey, Mr. Kasai?" a recruit asked.

"Please don't call me Mr. Kasai. It makes me feel older than I already am. Just call me John." I said.

"Okay. Um…John, what do you know about the turtles that we don't know already?" the recruit asked.

"Well, after searching their lair and eavesdropping on their private moments, I can tell you a few things. One, the blue one is Leonardo, the purple one is Donnie, the red one is Raph, and the orange one is Mikey. Two, these turtles have human allies they can rely on. And three, Yoshi has been brainwashing those turtles into thinking that Shredder caused all this chaos." I said.

"That's horrible! Who the hell brainwashes their own children?" a different recruit responded.

"Someone who doesn't deserve to exist in the same world as the rest of us." I said.

"Don't you think that's a little harsh to say?" a different recruit asked.

Right before I was going to respond, I stopped myself.

"Wait a minute. I…I recognize that voice." I thought to myself.

"Who said that?" I asked.

Several Foot Clan soldiers pointed towards a recruit who stuck out like a sore thumb due to his unathletic appearance and red mask.

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Uhhhh. Can you repeat the question?" the recruit said dumbly.

"Tell me your fucking name right now!" I yelled.

"It's…Timothy." he said with a nervous tone.

All the memories from the previous night came flooding back. He was the kid who wore that awful turtle costume and called himself "The Pulverizer". I thought about it more and I realized he must have a connection with turtles and he's only in the Foot Clan to give them information.

"He's a spy. He's a fucking spy! GET HIM!" I commanded as all the other Foot Clan soldiers in the room swarmed him.

I let them beat up Timothy for a good minute before telling them to back off because it was now my turn to make Timothy's life a living hell.

"Get up!" I yelled.

As soon as Timothy got back up to his feet, I brought him down again by delivering a spear (driving my shoulder into his midsection) and tackling him to the ground.

"If there's one thing I don't tolerate, it's a fucking spy! In the Foot Clan, being a spy is punishable by death. But now that I think about it, I have another idea. I'm not going to choose your fate. No…I'm going to let someone else choose your fate." I said.

I told Bebop and Rocksteady to grab Timothy by arms and drag him into the throne room.

When we walked back into the throne room, I saw Saki standing over Yoshi, who was now beaten to a bloody pulp. I saw about 20 lashes on Yoshi's back and he looked like he got hit by a truck, after getting hit in the face with a brick.

"Saki! We have a situation." I told him.

"What is it?" Saki asked with an annoyed tone.

"It turns out one of the new recruits was a spy working with the Turtles." I said as I pointed to Timothy, who was held down by Bebop and Rocksteady.

"WHAT?! HOW DID HE GET IN?!" Saki yelled.

"I don't know, but I quickly recognized him as the crap vigilante who calls himself "The Pulverizer" who tried and failed to confront me, Rocksteady, and Bebop yesterday." I said.

"You know what I do to spies." Saki said before a blade popped out of one of his gauntlets.

"I know but instead of you killing him, I wanted to make things more interesting." I said.

"How?" Saki asked.

"Instead of us deciding Timothy's fate, maybe we should let Hamato Yoshi decide his fate." I said.

"Hmmm. I like your idea." said Saki.

Saki then stomped on Yoshi's tail, which caused Yoshi to yell in pain.

"Wake up, rat! I'm going to give you a choice. Either you sacrifice yourself and let the boy live. Or you sacrifice the boy and I'll let you walk out of here alive. No matter what choice you make, the results won't be pleasant." Saki said as he pointed his blade dangerously close to Yoshi's throat.

Yoshi spent well over 30 seconds deciding on what he should do. I was starting to become impatient with Yoshi and yelled at him.

"YOSHI! MAKE THE FUCKING DECISION ALREADY! WHO'S GOING TO GET SACRIFICED?! YOU OR TIMOTHY?!"

Yoshi took a deep breath and regretfully said, "Timothy."

Wow. Just wow. Just when I thought Yoshi couldn't go any lower, he sacrificed a child just to save his own ass. It sickened both me and Saki to our core, but we didn't show it on our faces.

Meanwhile, Timothy was in complete shock, he looked like he was about to have a panic attack. Bebop and Rocksteady struggled a bit to hold him down. To stop Timothy from moving, I slowly walked around the immediate area, quickly building up steam, before rushing towards Timothy and giving him a running stomp to the back of his head, knocking him out temporarily.

Saki popped his blade back into his gauntlet, before roughly lifting Yoshi off the floor and shoving him away.

"DON'T. EVER. COME. BACK." Saki said with absolute hate in his voice.

A naked, beaten, and bloodied Yoshi then walked out of the Foot Clan HQ, leaving us with Timothy.

"You three figure out what to do with the boy. I'll be in my room. DO NOT disturb me." Saki said before leaving.

"What the heck are we going to do with him?" asked Bebop.

"I don't know. John, what do you think?" asked Rocksteady.

I thought about it for a few seconds, before a twisted idea popped in my head.

"I know exactly what we're going to do with him." I said with a sadistic smile on my face.

"STOCKMAN!" I yelled.

Stockman came running into the room, clearly out of breath.

"Oh, John. What do you need?" asked Stockman.

"I have a question for you. Have you ever seen a Saw movie?" I asked.

"Yeah. As illogical and nonsensical as they are, the series is a guilty pleasure of mine. Why?" said Stockman.

"I want you to set up a trap similar to the ones in those movies. It doesn't need to be fancy or elaborate, it just needs to be effective. Got it?" I said.

"Okay. I'll go get started on that." said Stockman.

Ten minutes of waiting later and Stockman showed us his finished creation. A large container of mutagen hung from the ceiling and below it was a restraint chair.

"It looks great." I said.

Stockman then gave me a remote and explained that if I pressed the middle button, the bottom of the container would open and the mutagen would fall onto the poor soul who was stuck in the chair.

"Perfect. Tell Tiger Claw to bring his flamethrower. You never know what to expect." I said.

It didn't take long to put Timothy in the chair, strap his arms and legs to the chair, and put a gag in his mouth, in order to not hear him scream so much. I had to slap Timothy in order to wake him up and as soon as he saw the predicament he was in, he knew he was fucked.

"Alright Pulverizer, you know your fate. You know this isn't going to end well for you. And I see you noticed the mutagen hanging above your head. Now, I'm going to press this red button on the remote in my hand and one of three things will happen. One, you could get really lucky and not only retain your human appearance but also get incredible powers similar to my own. Cool, right? Two, you lose your human appearance and become like my comrades: Bebop, Rocksteady, and Tiger Claw. Sure, you can't go out in public, but you still get some neat abilities. Three, you become a mindless, soulless monster and we'll kill you on the spot. So, for your sake, you better hope it's not number three." I said.

Timothy sat there with tears running down his face and piss leaking out of his uniform.

"Alright, here we go. In 3, 2, 1." I said before pressing the button.

Instantly, the mutagen fell from its' container and landed on Timothy, who screamed in pain. After screaming for a bit, Timothy's body began to change and it was not for the better. In fact, it was for the absolute worst, as his human body morphed into a disgusting blob…thing. The kid was now a grotesque mess of organs and honestly made me want to throw up, but I kept my cool.

"This…is really disappointing." I said.

"Look at him, he's completely useless. He can't speak, he can't move, I don't even think he's alive." said Tiger Claw.

"He is. Barely." said Stockman.

"I think we should just put this kid out of his misery. All those in favor say, Aye." I said.

Everyone in the room said, "Aye."

"All those opposed say, Nay." I said.

Not a single soul said Nay.

"Alright then. Tiger Claw, burn him." I said.

Tiger Claw pointed his flamethrower at Timothy's new form and burned him until there was nothing.

I quietly said, "He did this to himself", before leaving the room.

30 Minutes Later

Me, Bebop, and Rocksteady were now on a rooftop, waiting for the turtles to show up. After what we did to Yoshi, it was inevitable that they would come after us to fight for the "honor" of their shitty master. Since it was now past 1 am, the three of us were starting to get tired. In order to stay fully awake, I was listening and dancing to Michael Jackson singles, while Bebop and Rocksteady were doing some exercises.

While doing performing an impressive moonwalk, Bebop tapped me on the shoulder, which caused me to turn around and see the four turtles holding their weapons and looking very pissed off.

"Ah, it's you four, Yoshi's kids. I was wondering when you would show up. The name's John. John Kasai. These are my two best friends: Bebop and Rocksteady. How are you?" I said.

"What did you do to Sensei?" demanded Raph.

"Well, RAPH, I didn't do anything to your dear old dad. Shredder did most of the damage." I said.

"HOW THE FUCK DO YOU KNOW MY NAME?!" yelled Raph.

"I know all of your names, or at least your nicknames. Red is Raph, purple is Donnie, orange is Mikey, and blue is Leonardo or Leo or simplicity's sake. I found out via your private conversations." I said.

"Dude, that is not cool. That's an invasion of privacy." said Mikey.

"I know, but I really don't care." I said.

"Well, no matter what you did or didn't do to Sensei, you and your buddies are going to face the wrath of The Turtles of Justice!" Leo said with confidence.

Awkward silence ensued after Leo's cringe-filled line.

Raph glared at Leo and said, "Really Leo? You just had to sound like a dork, right now?"

"Yeah, it sounded a lot better in my head." Leo said with a sheepish expression.

"To be honest, the beginning and the middle sounded good, but the ending just killed the entire moment." I said.

"I DIDN'T ASK FOR YOUR OPINION!" Leo yelled, looking really embarrassed now.

"Hey, it's not my fault you sound like a certain someone from a bad space cartoon." I said.

Leo was shocked and asked, "How…how do you know that?"

"While snooping around in your lair, I saw some old Space Heroes VHS tapes near your little TV. It's sad that you worship such a garbage show that is a lawsuit-level rip-off of Star Trek. And it's even sadder that you use that show as a fucking blueprint for being a hero. Just like how some punk kid used you guys as a blueprint to be a pathetic hero." I said.

Donnie's eyes widened at my last statement and he quietly said, "Timothy?"

"Yeah, that's him." I said.

"What did you do to him? WHAT DID YOU DO?!" Donnie demanded.

"Let's just say…some poor parents out there will never see their baby boy ever again." I said.

Donnie had a look of horror on his face and that horror turned into absolute rage as he rushed towards me with his Bo staff, ready to attack.

"Come on reptile, give it all you got." I said quietly while getting in a fighting stance.

Donnie repeatedly swung his staff at me, trying to hit me, but I managed to dodge every strike. Using my inhuman athleticism, I decided to show off and perform several backflips, before bowing to Donnie in a mocking manner.

This only pissed Donnie off even more as he rushed towards me again, hoping to shove me off the rooftop. Luckily for me and not so luckily for Donnie, I was prepared for this. You see, the rooftop we were on was connected to a shorter rooftop since it was all the same building. We were on the higher rooftop, so I used environmental awareness to my advantage. Right as Donnie was about to swing his staff at my face, I grabbed his staff, pulled it closer to me, put him in a headlock, lifted him off the ground, walked a few steps backward, before falling off the higher rooftop and crashing through the RTU (rooftop unit) on the smaller rooftop.

That fall knocked both of us out for a little bit. Unfortunately for me, Donnie had a shell to protect himself, which meant he took less damage than I did. While getting up off the destroyed RTU, I saw Bebop and Rocksteady fighting the other three turtles. It looked like that despite the 2-on-3 disadvantage, they were holding their own up there and didn't need my help.

When me and Donnie got back to our feet, we went at it again, constantly blocking each other's attacks. I was honestly surprised by how good of a fighter he was. I thought he would be the weakest of the four because he had a nerdy/awkward look to him. And yet here he was, going toe to toe with me, the most dangerous human in history.

"I'll admit, you're better than I expected." I said somewhat out of breath.

"Thanks." Donnie said sarcastically before he unexpectedly lifted me off the ground and rammed me through a nearby door, causing the both of us to crash right through it and fall down the stairs.

As soon as I got up, Donnie threw a smoke bomb in my face, causing me to go temporarily blind. Once I was able to regain visibility, Donnie was gone. He vanished just like the ninja he and his brothers proclaimed to be.

"Damnit!" I yelled in frustration.

Not even one second later, I heard a noise coming from one of the rooms in the hallway. Being smart, I thoroughly checked all the rooms in the hallway, only to find nothing in a majority of them. The last room I checked was a science lab, which looked normal for the most part, until I saw a broken coffee mug on the floor.

"Bingo." I said.

While looking at the broken mug, I didn't notice that Donnie came out of a closet (NO, not in THAT way) and before I could even react, he hit me right in the back with his Bo staff. I quickly recovered and kicked his right leg, which caused him to fall to one knee. In what was clearly a desperation move, he converted the end of his Bo staff into a blade and swung it right at my throat. I barely managed to dodge the attack, but it shocked me how close he really was to killing me. In fact, I was in such shock that all I could do for the next few seconds was stare at Donnie in complete and utter disbelief.

Once I regained my senses, I delivered a stiff kick to his head, before grabbing him by both his ninja belt and the top of his shell and throwing him across the room. He ended up landing hard on a lab table and falling to the floor. I walked up to him and grabbed the tails of his mask, but to my surprise, he grabbed a glass tube off the floor and hit me right in the head with it, causing me to let go of his mask and stumble backward into a bookshelf.

Let me tell you right now, the glass tube Donnie used was not made out of cheap glass. It was made out of HARD glass and it FUCKING HURT. I felt like my head was split open. Part of me hoped it was just a light cut and nothing serious. I put my right hand on my forehead, took it off, and all I saw was blood. Lots of blood. WAY more than I was comfortable with. I did a similar thing with my left hand and the results were the same. I then turned around and saw myself in a mirror and the cut was worse than I could imagine. My entire face was red. BLOOD RED. It was so bad you couldn't even see my skin color. The blood was dripping onto my clothes and on the floor. I thought I would be dealing with a drizzle of blood coming from my head. Instead, I was dealing with A FUCKING FAUCET.

"That bastard hit an artery." I said to myself.

It was at this exact moment that I was so grateful for the mutagen in my bloodstream. If I didn't have that mutagen, I would've definitely passed out from the blood loss. However, I was still feeling super woozy, so that didn't help.

I then looked at Donnie, who looked absolutely horrified at my current state. Could you really blame him? I was bleeding like a stuffed pig. I'd be horrified too.

Anyway, Donnie attempted to land a kick on me, but I grabbed his foot, pulled him closer to me, grabbed him around by his waist, and threw him back first, or shell first in this case, into a bookshelf (A move known as a belly to belly suplex for all you wrestling enthusiasts out there).

I did this to Donnie two more times, throwing him into a whiteboard and into a glass shelf. But somehow, he still got up. I was so tired and exhausted from the blood loss that I decided to end the fight right there by delivering a running stomp to his head, finally knocking him out.

"Thank fuck, he's out. Time to see how Bebop and Rocksteady handling the other turtles." I said.

I put Donnie's unconscious body on my shoulders and walked out of the science lab. I walked until I found an entrance to the rooftop. Once I made it to the rooftop, I saw Bebop and Rocksteady and they didn't look any better when compared to me. Bebop had a nasty gash on his right arm, a busted lip, and a stab wound on his left foot, while Rocksteady had a bad cut on his knee, a cut right below his eye, and a stab wound on the left side of his body. I also noticed how they were lacking pants and only wearing their jockstraps.

"What happened to your pants?" I asked.

"The orange one thought he could embarrass us by using a blade to rip a massive hole through our pants. Little did he know about our nudist tendencies, so we decided to just tear them off completely." said Rocksteady.

I simply responded with "Oh."

"What the hell happened to your face?" asked Bebop.

"Donnie, the turtle on my shoulders, hit me in the head with a glass tube. He actually cut into an artery, which caused my face to look like…this." I said.

"Dude, it looks like you've lost a lot of blood. Are you sure you're going to be okay?" asked Bebop.

"I'll be fine. The mutagen helps quicken the healing process. All we need to do now is take out all the turtles. I've taken out one, but… where are the others?" I asked before setting Donnie's body down to the ground.

"Don't know. One of them threw a smoke bomb in our faces and they just disappeared." said Rocksteady.

"FUCK!" I yelled to the top of my lungs.

"Oh, I know how we can find those turtles." said Bebop.

"Okay, how?" asked Rocksteady.

"Let's get the purple one off the ground and I'll tell you." said Bebop.

"Fine." said Rocksteady.

The two mutants lifted the helpless Donnie off the ground by his arms.

"Now what?" asked Rocksteady.

"On the count of three, we throw him off the roof." said Bebop.

"Wait, what? How does that help with anything other than causing the turtle more pain?" asked Rocksteady.

"Trust me, dude. This will work. Okay, one…" said Bebop.

"Two…" said Rocksteady.

"THREE!" the two mutants said simultaneously before throwing Donnie off the rooftop, which led to him crash land into an air conditioner on a lower rooftop.

In the distance, you could hear Donnie's name being screamed by his brothers, who reappeared and were trying to help their injured brother.

"Boom. What did I tell you?" said Bebop and he and Rocksteady gave each other a high-five.

I was going to say something, but I was suddenly hit with a rather sadistic urge and it made me get down to my knees and hold my head.

"Hey John, are you alright?" asked Rocksteady.

At this exact moment, John Kasai was gone. And in his place was a persona I called "The Antichrist of Ninjutsu".

My eyes went from blue to black and red and the feeling of control was long gone.

Bebop and Rocksteady looked at me in fear and tried to calm me down by comforting me.

"John. What's…what's wrong?" asked Rocksteady.

Before Rocksteady could put his hand on me, I got up off the ground, immediately ran towards the edge of the rooftop, and jumped off, like a complete madman. While in the air, I made sure to aim for the turtles and knock them all down at once. And that's exactly what I did. To say the turtles were surprised to see me flying towards them would be an understatement.

Raph even said, "Holy shit!" before I fell right into them and knocked them all down like bowling pins.

Once I got off the turtles, I performed a loud, animalistic scream that was a mix of pain, anger, and rage.

After that, all hell broke loose. I wasn't a human anymore. I was a fucking machine.

I grabbed each of the turtles gave them all a variety of suplexes. I gave Leo a German suplex, Raph a belly to belly, Mikey a full-rotation German suplex (which caused Mikey to flip over, landing stomach-first), and Donnie a belly to back suplex.

Everything was going fine, until Raph unexpectedly hit me in the face with a flying kick, causing me to take an unintentional backflip. Raph also managed to take out Bebop via a punch to the balls and a headbutt. Thankfully, Rocksteady came to my rescue and hit Raph in the back (or the shell, in this case) with a sledgehammer, taking him down.

"A sledgehammer?" I asked.

"Hey, you never know when you need it." said Rocksteady.

"Just grab Raph's leg and stretch it out." I said.

"Which leg?" asked Rocksteady.

"IT DOESN'T MATTER WHICH LEG!" I yelled.

Rocksteady did exactly that and stretched out Raph's right leg.

"Now give me the hammer." I said.

"Why?" asked Rocksteady.

"I SAID GIVE ME THE FUCKING HAMMER!" I yelled.

With zero hesitation, Rocksteady tossed me the sledgehammer, I lifted it up, and dropped it straight down onto Raph's right knee.

Raph screamed in absolute agony as he grabbed his right knee and began to cry in pain.

Before I could even say anything, I got rocked with a sidekick to the face from Mikey, which legit made my body go limp for a few seconds. Rocksteady tried to swing his sledgehammer at Mikey, but Mikey's speed made it impossible for him to get a solid hit. Getting frustrated, Rocksteady wildly swung his hammer to the ground, only for it to get stuck. And in a moment that impressed the hell out of me, Mikey ran up the sledgehammer and in midair, smashed Rocksteady's face with his nunchaku.

"Yeah, boy! Michelangelo for the win!" Mikey yelled while doing a victory dance.

While he was distracted, I got up, ran full steam ahead, and hit him with a spear as hard as I possibly could. As Mikey laid on the ground in pain, I turned him over, wrapped both my hands around his face, and pulled back, properly applying a cross-face. To make it worse for Mikey, I intentionally lowered my hands down to his neck, turning it into a chokehold. It took approximately 40 seconds for me to choke Mikey into unconsciousness.

Once I let go of the hold, I stood up and a bit of a breather. That turned out to a mistake as Leo delivered a low blow by giving me an uppercut to my groin. I could tell he put some force into that uppercut because DAMN, IT FUCKING HURT. The low blow made me bend over and it even caused some drool to come out of my mouth. As soon as the shock wore off, I performed a backflip and kicked Leo right in the head, knocking him down.

I laid down for a few seconds before bringing myself back to my feet with a kip-up. Out of pure anger, I grabbed Leo's left arm and began to bend it at an unnatural angle. I continued to bend it until heard a crack, which meant Leo's arm was now officially broken. Leo then grabbed his left arm and screamed in pain.

And just when I thought I was done, I got hit in the back with what felt like a hockey stick. I was hit several more times until I was down to my knees. While attempting to get up, I saw someone running towards me and he was yelling "Goongala" for God knows what reason. It was probably his battle cry. Anyway, right before he struck me again with his hockey stick, I grabbed him, lifted him up, and slammed him down with a brutal spine buster. I now got a good look at my attacker and it turned out to be Casey, who was wearing a painted goalie mask that resembled a skull.

In hindsight, I should've stopped what I was doing and left the rooftop. But I didn't. Instead, I grabbed Casey by his ankles and swung him around like a javelin into a brick wall. I did this again and again and again until he was out like a light.

Once I let go of Casey, I was confronted by April, who didn't recognize me. She screamed and yelled at me, before slapping me right in the face. And what happened next is something I will never be proud of. I delivered a vicious clothesline to April, turning her inside out in the process. I then brought her up off the ground, before quickly lifting her up and dropping her spine-first on my knee, causing her to scream in pain. While April was down on her knees, I grabbed her by her waist, lifted her up, and brought her down with a gut-wrench powerbomb. The impact of the move was sickening, as it felt like I just broke her in half. It made me feel sick. It made me feel like a fucking monster.

I screamed in both anger and anguish until Donnie got back up and tried to hit me with his Bo staff. That ended up backfiring on him as I grabbed the staff and broke it in half with my knee. We then stared at each other, waiting for one of us to make the next move. My face was still covered in blood, so I can't imagine Donnie was enjoying that visual. We stared at each other for what felt like hours, in when reality it was only a few seconds until I pretty much said "Fuck it" and rushed towards Donnie with a flurry of punches and kicks.

As I kept punching and kicking, Donnie hit me with a quick jab and I suddenly had a strange feeling in my left arm. It felt incredibly numb, which concerned me. I tried to move it, but it wouldn't budge. My left arm was paralyzed. It was now completely useless. Donnie managed to hit a pressure point and I didn't even notice.

"YOU MOTHERFUCKER!" I yelled.

Before I could use my good arm to attack, Donnie hit me in the head with a roundhouse kick and delivered several forearm strikes to my face. We then dodged each other's attacks. I dodged a backhand strike from Donnie, while Donnie dodged a high knee strike from me. I dodged a low kick from Donnie by performing a temporary handstand (with only one hand, mind you), while Donnie dodged a front flip kick from me by simply moving out of harm's way. I was finally able to land something on Donnie by delivering a sidekick on Donnie's left leg. Once he was on one knee, I ran towards him, hoping to perform another running stomp to the back of his head. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. Instead, right as my foot was on the back of Donnie's head, he got up, which caused me to flip over, but thanks to my athleticism, I landed on my feet. Thank God for my ninja training because that could've ended in disaster for me. Donnie tried to hit me with a reverse roundhouse kick, but I dodged at the last second and hit Donnie with an enzuigiri (a jumping kick to the back of the head), causing the two of us to collapse to the ground.

The two of us laid on the ground for several minutes, neither of us willing to get up. We were physically and emotionally exhausted. I never would have guessed that fighting a ninja turtle would be so fucking hard.

Eventually, I got up off the ground and waited for Donnie to do the same. I tried to get some feeling back into my left arm, but nothing was working.

"Fuck it. I'll deal with it later." I said.

After waiting for a bit, Donnie finally got up off the ground and was now on his feet. This was my chance. This was my chance to finish Donnie once and for all and complete the mission. I psyched myself up before running full steam ahead, ready to use my good arm to clothesline Donnie's throat. In a move I did not see coming, Donnie jumped up, grabbed my arm IN MIDAIR, twisted us both down to the ground, and now my good arm was locked in a cross armbar. Luckily, I knew how to escape this hold. All I had to do was get up to my feet, lift Donnie up with pure strength, and drop him with a powerbomb. I had to do this three times until Donnie finally let go of my arm.

I took a few seconds to catch my breath, but before I could even move, Donnie wrapped his legs around my neck and pulled my arm towards him, trapping me in a triangle choke. I desperately tried to escape this hold, but Donnie had it locked in surprisingly tight. I knew that if I didn't get out of the hold in the next few seconds, I would lose consciousness. And just when things looked grim for me, my bros, Bebop and Rocksteady came to my rescue and pulled Donnie off me.

I couldn't believe it. A turtle. A goddamn teenage mutant ninja turtle, who had FAR less experience than me, was mere seconds away from making me pass out. My pride was officially shot.

Out of anger and embarrassment, I grabbed a steel pipe off the ground and started hitting Donnie in his midsection with it. I hit him over and over again, without a doubt breaking several of his ribs in the process. With each time I hit Donnie, Bebop and Rocksteady became more and more concerned by my behavior.

While I was destroying Donnie with a pipe, I didn't notice that some pathetic, overweight, middle-aged man started yelling about "Kung-Fu Frogs". If I wasn't in my psychotic trance, I would've told him to read a fucking book because ANYBODY WITH EYES CAN TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A FROG AND A TURTLE. I ignored his yelling until he grabbed my arm.

This made me snap.

I turned around and hit the old man right in the head with the pipe. When he collapsed to the ground, I hit him even harder in the head with the pipe. The man's body started to twitch. I then dropped the pipe and delivered multiple punches to his now-bloody head. If you thought that was bad, I got up and stomped on the man's head multiple times. The whole thing was a damn horror show and I couldn't stop. At that point, Bebop and Rocksteady had to pull me away from the man and sit me down against a brick wall.

"John, you need to stop! It's over!" yelled Bebop.

"The battle is over, John. We've won." said Rocksteady.

Their words got me to calm down and after closing my eyes and opening them back up, my natural eye color returned and my rage was gone.

I looked at all the carnage around me and said, "Oh God. I…I did all this?"

"Yeah, it was not pretty." said Bebop.

Looking at the broken, beaten bodies of the turtles, April, and Casey tore my heart apart. And then hit me like a freight train. They were kids. Teenagers. They were no older than Kate. April and Casey were Kate's best friends and I…I hurt them. And the turtles…they were brainwashed by Yoshi. It wasn't their fault that they were put into this situation. They were completely innocent.

"Come on, John. Let's go back to HQ." Bebop said softly.

I got up off the ground, grabbed Bebop and Rocksteady's hands, and teleported us back to the Foot HQ.

When we got there, everyone was shocked at our appearances.

"JESUS CHRIST, WHAT HAPPENED?!" asked Bradford.

"It's done." I said quietly.

"You three need medical attention ASAP." said Stockman.

"I know. I know. We'll be in the medical room." I said with an annoyed tone.

Once we entered the medical room, the three of us decided to take off our clothes, because they were stained in blood and sweat. So, I was now butt-ass naked, sitting in between my two bros, who were also butt-ass naked. Personally, I've never felt comfortable being naked around other people. The only people who have seen me naked are Susan, Bebop, Rocksteady and that's it. But after all the damage I took in the fight, I knew I would need a full-body examination.

Rocksteady saw me shaking a bit and asked, "John, you alright?"

"No. I'm not. I hurt kids. I hurt Kate's friends. The fuck am I supposed to say to their parents?" I said.

"I don't know. To be honest, I'm starting to feel guilty about it." said Bebop.

"Same here. I didn't join the Foot Clan to harm minors." said Rocksteady.

"But we did and I've never felt worse in my entire life. I feel like a monster." I said with tears threatening to fall from my eyes.

Both Bebop and Rocksteady put their arms around me as I started to break down into tears. I was so glad to have those two as my best friends. They were willing to support me when I was at my lowest point.

Three days later, I decided I was done with the Foot Clan. I would leave and never come back. It was a hard, but necessary decision. My mental health was getting worse as I began to hate myself over what I did three days prior. I had several outbursts with my fellow Foot members and spend most of my time in my private room. The only people I was willing to talk to were Saki, Bebop, Rocksteady, and Bradford. When I told them about me leaving the Clan, they were all very supportive and understood why I had to leave.

Saying goodbye to all of them, especially Saki, was one of the toughest things I've done. Although I would still be in contact with the four of them, things would never be the same again.

I walked out of the Foot Clan HQ and that was it. A 20-year era was officially over and there was no turning back. Now it was time to be with Susan and Kate and make sure Kate "survives" high school.

How hard could that be?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that is it for Chapter 6. BOY, that was tough to write. Writing fighting sequences turned out to be much harder than I anticipated because I spent hours looking up the proper names of wrestling moves, since John has a WWE-esque fighting style. I know the way I mutated Timothy was WAY darker than the actual show, but it was necessary to show how ruthless the Foot Clan can truly be. Also, I hope you don't hate me for how I brutalized the turtles, April, and Casey. And don't worry, none of their injuries were permanent and they will all make a full recovery by the next chapter. Speaking of the next chapter, it will not be from the perspective of John. Instead, it will be from the perspectives of Mikey and Leo. The chapter after that will be from the perspectives of Raph and Donnie, so you're going to be seeing a lot more turtles throughout the rest of the story. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.


	7. Orange And Blue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter will be from the POV of Mikey and Leo. While Mikey's character change won't be too drastic, Leo's character change will be far more extreme, so be prepared. Enjoy.

Mikey's POV

Ever since we got our shells handed to us by that John Kasai guy, things have not been going too good for me and my bros.

While my injury wasn't too bad, my bros weren't so lucky. Raph had a broken leg, Leo had a broken arm, and Donnie had several broken ribs. Not to mention that April suffered a broken tailbone and Casey had a massive concussion. None of us were allowed to leave the lair until we all were 100% healed, which meant we all had to suffer through several months of ABSOLUTE BOREDOM. None of us were happy about that, particularly Raph, who had to use crutches to get around the lair. It didn't help that it was the winter season and as Donnie explained it to me a few years ago…

Cold-Blooded Animals + Cold Weather= Bad News For Us

And even without all of us catching the injury bug, we couldn't go outside very often. So, while my bros were doing their own thing, I spent a lot of my time watching old Nick cartoons like Avatar: The Last Airbender and Danny Phantom (My all-time favorite shows BTW). I also did what I do best whenever my bros were in the dumps. I cracked some jokes, pulled some pranks, and said the most ridiculous stuff to get a reaction out of them. Sometimes it got them to laugh, other times it led to them chasing me around the lair. No matter how it ended for me, it was better than watching them be miserable.

Once we were all healed up (thanks to the wonderful power of mutagen), we went back to the surface to fight the Kraang and the Foot, but something felt…off. That John Kasai dude was nowhere to be seen. It was like he vanished after kicking our shells into the next century. I tried asking some Foot Soldiers about him and none of them gave me a straight answer. It was always some vague crap like "He is not of your concern" or "We don't talk about him." It was really strange.

Although my bros have stopped thinking about Kasai, I haven't. The guy was so mysterious, powerful, and admittedly cool-looking that I needed to know more about him. How the heck did we not know about this guy sooner? Why was this guy more powerful than an average human? Why did the Foot Clan not talk about him anymore? These were all questions that were racing through my mind and they weren't going to go away until I got some answers.

February 8, 2013

"Wake up Mikey! It's time for you to cook breakfast!" Donnie yelled from outside my room.

"Okay, I'm up." I said before stretching out my arms and putting on my signature orange bandanna. I quickly rolled out of bed and walked straight to the kitchen.

I was currently wearing some white briefs I found several months ago on one of our first patrols. A pack of these things just happened to be in a shopping bag right next to a dumpster, likely abandoned by some random person. Being the curious turtle I am, I grabbed the bag, took it to my room, and tried on a pair. And you know what, I really liked them. They were super comfortable and helped me sleep better at night. Sure, my bros thought it was weird and Raph constantly made fun of me for it, but I didn't care.

I entered the kitchen to see my favorite bros in the whole world talking about last night's patrol. It was nothing special, just our usual fights with the Kraang and the Foot Clan.

"Morning, guys." I said with a smile.

"Morning, Mikey." said Leo and Donnie.

"Morning, doofus." Raph said rudely.

"And good morning to you, dragon breath." I fired back. Raph didn't say anything and only growled at my response.

"So, what are we having today, Mikey?" asked Donnie.

"Glad you asked, D. We're having pancakes!" I said excitedly.

"At least you're cooking something normal and not another food abomination." said Raph.

"Come on, my custom recipes aren't that bad." I replied.

"Mikey, no offense, but your recipes can be pretty bad. Remember the time you attempted to make your own version of "The Luther" from The Boondocks?" said Donnie.

"I thought it looked pretty tasty." I said innocently.

"MIKEY, it got us all sick. For God's sake, I was vomiting from both ends." said Raph.

"Okay, so maybe that recipe was a bust, but you all know I'm not perfect. I'm allowed to make mistakes. Besides, it's not like you guys died from my dishes." I said.

"It certainly felt like death." said Donnie.

Leo defended me and said, "Come on guys, lay off on Mikey. He's a better cook than any of us will ever be."

"He's definitely better than you, Fearless. You're a disaster in the kitchen. You'd probably burn the kitchen down by making a salad." said Raph.

I had to laugh at Raph's sick burn because it was true. Leo was a master at ninjutsu and a trainwreck of a cook. No one trusts him with making meals. He would accidentally poison us without even knowing it.

After eating breakfast, it was time for morning practice. We spent half an hour meditating, which I didn't like because I sucked at mediation. My ADHD and overactive mind made it borderline impossible for me to stay still and concentrate. And even when I was able to concentrate, all I saw were images of Kasai and his bloody face.

Once that was done, Sensei put us into sparring matches with each other. I went up against Raph, while Leo went up against Donnie. Raph and I fought for about 4 minutes until he forced me to submit via an armbar. Donnie beat Leo in a shocking upset by making him submit via a triangle choke. Ever since Donnie told us what happened in his fight with Kasai, he was a force to be reckoned with. He earned a lot of respect from all of us, especially Raph. In fact, since the fight, Raph spent a lot of time with Donnie and now the two have basically become best friends. While I was sad that I was spending less time with Donnie, at least he would stop Raph from bullying me so much.

The rest of the day was pretty boring. Leo mediated in his room, Raph was on the phone with Casey, Donnie was on the phone with April, and I lounged around in my underwear, watching cartoons and reading comic books. Just the way I liked it.

Later That Night

I was assigned to get pizza for my bros and make sure nobody was following me. Like the awesome ninja I am, I managed to get the pizza, leave the pizza man some money, and get out with anyone seeing me.

I gracefully climbed to the nearest rooftop, looked at my surroundings, looked at the pizza, and smiled.

"And my bros say I'm the clumsy one." I said confidently.

Not one second later, I tripped on a rock that magically appeared out of nowhere and fell flat on my face, dropping the pizza.

Thankfully, the pizza was unharmed. I can't say the same about my pride though.

"Great job, Mikey. You had one job." I said to myself.

As soon as I got up, I heard a yell nearby. It sounded like a girl. I walked to the other side of the rooftop and looked below. I saw a teenage girl, no older than me, surrounded by a group of Foot Ninja.

"What the hell do you guys want?" she yelled.

"Mistress Karai wanted no witnesses. Therefore, you must be eliminated." one Foot Solider said.

"You realize that if you kill me, my father will murder every last of you in a heartbeat." she said.

"Your father walked out on us and caused half of our members to walk out with him. Besides, you're all alone and no one is going to come to your rescue." another Foot Solider said.

The girl then put on some brass knuckles and said, "You better hope this fight ends quickly then."

"That's it. I'm going in." I said before dropping down, right next to where the girl was standing.

At first, she looked at me with surprise, but then that surprise turned into a smile when she realized I was on her side.

"Oh great. It's one of those turtle freaks." said a random Foot Solider.

"Let's get them both!" another Foot Solider said.

Me and the girl looked at each other again before we engaged the Foot Soldiers. Turns out the girl was surprisingly well-trained in combat and she was able to handle her own against multiple Foot Soldiers. After a while, the fight started to become fun as the two of us cracked some jokes and took down all the Foot Soldiers.

Once the last Foot Soldier was KO'ed, me and the girl were finally able to talk to each other.

"Thanks for the help. I appreciate it." she said.

"No problem, it's all in a day's work for a ninja turtle. Wait a second, you're…you're not scared of me?" I asked.

"No, why?" she replied.

"HELLO, I'm a walking, talking mutant turtle that knows ninjutsu. Doesn't that freak you out just a little bit?" I asked.

"No, my dad's a mutant and his best friends are mutants." she said like it was nothing.

I was shell-shocked (I know, bad pun) by what she said. The only humans who know about mutants are April, Casey, April's dad, and the Foot Clan.

"Oh. Well…that makes things a lot easier. God, this is awkward. I'm Mikey by the way." I said in the most awkward tone possible while holding out my hand.

"Kate." she said as we shook hands.

"So…Kate, you want me to accompany you home, in case someone else jumps us?" I asked.

"Sure. I wouldn't mind." said Kate.

"Cool, but first I need to grab my pizzas." I said before quickly climbing up the rooftop again, grabbing the boxes filled with the greatest food in the history of ever, and dropping down to the ground again.

I checked the pizzas again and I was hit with crushing disappointment.

"Aww man. The pizzas got cold." I said with a sad tone.

"Don't worry Mikey, we can heat them back up at my place, once I let my parents know that you saved me from going to the hospital…again." said Kate.

"Again?" I asked not knowing what she was talking about.

"I'd rather not talk about it." Kate said and I immediately knew not to go further with that discussion.

After Kate talked with her parents on the phone (she did tell them that I was in fact, a teenage mutant ninja turtle), we walked over to her place, and BOY, it was not what I was expecting. I thought she would've lived in a simple apartment, NOT A FREAKIN' SKYSCRAPER.

"You live here?" I asked.

"Yeah, my dad bought it. He's rich. Like, stupid rich." said Kate.

We walked inside the building and entered the elevator. While listening to some good old elevator music, I took the opportunity to get a proper look at Kate. She was wearing a black and red tank top that exposed her midriff, black pants, black shoes, but the most notable feature about her was her hair. Her hair was black, but the ends of her hair were dyed red. I thought it looked really cool and I continued to look at it until she caught me.

"Like what you see?" asked Kate.

"Um…yeah. I…I just thought your hair looked…um, pretty cool." I said.

Real smooth, Mikey. Real smooth.

"Oh, why thank you. I get a lot of compliments about my hair. And… I noticed that you have freckles." said Kate.

"Yeah, it looks pretty weird." I said, awkwardly rubbing the back of my neck.

"No, it's not weird at all. In fact, I think it looks super cute." said Kate.

"Really? Thanks." I said as we both smiled at each other.

Eventually, we got to the top floor, and immediately, Kate's mom came out of nowhere to hug Kate.

"Thank God, you're okay. Did anyone follow you?" asked Kate's mom.

"No Mom, nobody followed us." said Kate.

"Good." Kate's mom said before she looked at me. "So, you're the one who came to my daughter's aid?"

"Yep, that would be me. I saw Kate surrounded by Foot Soldiers, no one was around to help her, so I jumped in and we kicked all of them into next week." I said confidently.

"Thank God for that. Most people in this city wouldn't even bat an eye at that situation." said Kate's mom.

"Yeah. Oh, I forgot to introduce myself. My name's Michelangelo, but I prefer Mikey." I said, holding out my hand.

Kate's mom shook it and said, "Susan. Susan Kasai. I would prefer you call me Susan and not Mrs. Kasai or Kate's mom."

As soon as she said her last name, it was like the whole world just stopped.

"Mikey? Are you okay?" asked Kate.

It was like I couldn't breathe for a moment. If both Susan and Kate's last names were Kasai, then that must mean…

Before I could finish that thought, John suddenly teleported into the room and asked, "What happened? Who attacked you?"

"Some Foot Soldiers, Dad. Sent by Karai, apparently." said Kate.

"That bitch. When I see her again, I swear I'm going to…" John said before he stopped and saw me.

The few seconds we looked at each other felt like a lifetime. I couldn't believe it. I just saved the daughter of the man who tried to destroy my entire family. The weird thing was that John actually looked quite normal. He was wearing normal clothes and nothing that screamed he was apart of the Foot Clan.

"Um…do you two know each other?" asked Kate.

"Yeah, we do. I fought him and his brothers on a rooftop a few months back. One of his brothers, Donnie I think, caused this scar on the top of my head." John said while pointing to the somewhat noticeable scar on his forehead.

"Well, you and your two friends put us all on the shelf for weeks. Me, Leo, Donnie, Raph, April, Casey, and Splinter!" I yelled.

"Wait, you're the reason April and Casey got injured?" Kate asked John.

John sighed and said, "Yes."

Kate immediately lost it and started yelling at John. "You asshole! How could you do that?! They were my friends!"

"I know. There's no excuse for what I did. I've regretted it every day. I didn't even know those two were involved in our conflict before that day." said John.

I looked at John and all I could see was genuine remorse on his face. It didn't look fake at all and I'm very good at knowing when people are faking emotions. He definitely didn't look like he was proud of what he did that day. It made me stop being angry at him.

This caused Kate to stop and ask, "What? What are you talking about?"

"Kate…April and Casey are friends with the turtles. That's why in my psychotic rage, I saw them as enemies and brutalized them." said John.

"Really? Mikey, is he telling the truth?" asked Kate.

"Yeah, it's complete fact. We've known April and Casey for months now and they've helped us on our missions. Also, I saw John's eyes and they were black and red. That might explain why he was so vicious that night." I said.

"When the heck were you able to do that?" asked Kate.

"Recently. It only happens when I'm in an absolute rage." said John.

After the three of us talked things out, John apologized for his actions and I ultimately forgave him. He was cool with me and Kate being friends and he even offered me secret Foot Clan information that only he knew. Knowing how tired I was of fighting the Foot almost every single day, I gladly excepted the information. It turned out to be incredibly useful and I was the only one who knew about it.

For the next few weeks, my schedule worked like this. I woke up, ate breakfast, trained, relaxed, ate dinner, trained some more, and about two hours before patrol, I told my bros and Sensei that I was going to be "riding my board". That last part was a lie, as I actually spent those two hours hanging out with Kate and talking to John and Susan. It turns out that me and Kate had a lot in common. We were both huge fans of Avatar and Danny Phantom, we liked the same type of video games (although Kate's tastes were more sophisticated than mine), and we both loved internet culture. Being with Kate was a huge breath of fresh air because although I love my bros to death, being around them 24/7 got really exhausting. Especially, since they were making fun of me most of the time.

John and Susan were probably the coolest parents I've ever met. They didn't keep Kate on a leash or acted like dictators towards her. Instead, they allowed her to live her life and were only strict when it was absolutely necessary. I loved talking to Susan because she was the mother figure I've always wanted. She was caring, smart, and wasn't afraid to speak her mind.

When talking to John, I never would've guessed how funny he was. Some of his Foot Clan stories were downright hilarious and hearing him talk about the people he had to deal with on a daily basis made me die of laughter. But at the same time, I learned a lot of valuable information from him. I learned how Bradford had a family and how Bebop and Rocksteady were actually a couple (which made me feel guilty for making gay jokes about them). I appreciated how he treated me like I had some intelligence, unlike my bros. He tested me on how smart I was by asking me stuff about history, science, math, English, etc. I managed to answer most of the questions correctly and even if I got something wrong, he didn't mock me or tease me about it. Instead, he told me the right answer, explained why it was right, and gave me some words of encouragement. Not once did he treat me like an idiot or a dumb child. It felt really nice. He also convinced me to eat less pizza, which I first thought was blasphemy. But after reading about how your metabolism decreases the more you age, eating more healthy foods would probably be for the best.

John also offered to train me in his personal fighting style. Considering how ruthless his style was, I accepted his offer. His fighting style was a mix of ninjutsu and wrestling moves. And after taking a few wrestling moves, I regret ever saying wrestling was fake because those moves can do some serious damage. The two moves I mastered were the backflip kick and the "shining wizard" (a knee strike to the back of someone's head), which I used to take down John in one of our sparring matches. When I beat him, he didn't yell or get annoyed that he lost. Instead, he smiled and told me I did a great job. Just hearing the words "Great job" made me feel so happy since I didn't hear those words come out of my bros or Sensei very often.

John was like a second dad to me and for some strange reason, I actually felt more comfortable being around him than Sensei.

Leo's POV

The past few weeks have been very odd when it came to my brothers. Raph and Donnie were constantly on the phone with Casey and April. It was like their phones were superglued to their hands. Not to mention that those two have basically become best friends, which baffles me to no end. But what really threw me off was how Mikey was acting.

Now, Mikey has always had a reputation for acting strange, but recently, he's been taking it to a whole new level. Just a few days ago, Mikey rejected a slice of pizza. Yeah, you heard me right.

MIKEY. REJECTED. PIZZA.

Do you realize how insane that is? That's the equivalent of Donnie rejecting coffee. It doesn't make any sense.

In addition, he's been leaving the lair a lot more often, he's been acting more aggressive during training, and he actually CLEANED UP HIS ROOM, which never happens, EVER. He's also been eating healthier foods which just doesn't sit right with me. Mikey was in love with junk food and now out of the blue, he pulled a complete 180. He was still pulling pranks on us, so that didn't change. But still, something just didn't feel right, but there was a part of me that wasn't too concerned about it. I just thought he got more mature because of "The Kasai incident" (as I like to call it). Heck, everyone changed after that night, even Sensei, so I didn't think it was too much of a big deal. Besides, it was about time that Mikey stopped being so childish all the time.

It wasn't until Mikey had a sparring session with Raph when I got concerned.

March 15, 2013

I was peacefully sleeping in my traditional Japanese bed, having a nice dream about being with Karai, until the dreaded sound of beeping ruined everything.

I opened my eyes and looked at my alarm clock, which displayed the current time of 5:00 AM.

Yep, I had to be an early riser. Just another perk of being the leader.

I turned the alarm off, got out of bed, and stretched out my limbs.

"Okay. Time for some early morning torture." I said to myself before leaving my room.

Early morning training was by far the worst aspect of becoming the team leader. I had to wake up hours before my brothers and enter the dojo, where Sensei was waiting for me. I would then spend roughly three hours performing katas, flips, flexibility exercises, and even sparring with Sensei. For some strange reason, Sensei was more intense when it came to our private lessons. He wouldn't hesitate to leave a mark or a bruise on my skin. He would only apologize afterward and even then it was a half-hearted apology.

He kept telling me that he was only making me train this hard because I'm the leader and I have to protect my brothers and I have to defeat the Shredder, etc., etc. I really wanted to believe his words, but there's a part of me that feels that he's lying to me or he's hiding something from me. I know it sounds horrible that I don't trust my own father, the man who raised me, but something felt…off about Sensei. I didn't say anything about it to anyone, but I constantly thought about it on my own time, while meditating.

After early morning training was over, I decided to take a shower because I needed to feel clean after last night's encounter with the Spy-Roach. Raph puked on me after looking at the mutated cockroach's "dead" body. Yeah, it wasn't a fun time. So, I walked into the bathroom, took off all my gear, entered the shower, turned on the semi-hot water, and let the water run down my body. While showering, I took the opportunity to sing one of my favorite songs, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Nirvana. Ever since I was a child, I LOVED to sing. I sang songs from all types of genres. Rock, rap, metal, pop, Silly Songs With Larry, you name it. Well, all genres except Country. Country music can burn. Singing was my passion, but it was a passion I hid from my entire family. My brothers would mock me to no end and Sensei would tell me "Focus on your ninja training.", "Nothing else matters.", "You have to be the leader of the Hamato Clan one day.", and a bunch of other crap. Does he actually think I want to do nothing but ninja training for the rest of my life? Am I not allowed to have other interests?

While using a back brush as a microphone, a knock on the bathroom door caused me to jump up and scream.

"Leo, are you in there?" asked Mikey.

"Yeah, I'm taking a shower." I said while regaining my composure.

"Were…were you singing in there?" asked Mikey.

"NO." I said a little too quickly.

"Well, if you were, you have a great singing voice. You should use it sometime." Mikey said before leaving.

I quickly turned off the water and dried myself with a towel. I can't believe I was THAT close to getting caught. At least now I know that Mikey won't make fun of me for singing. Donnie, I'm not too sure about, but Raph, he would tease me until the end of time.

Once I put on new gear, I entered the kitchen to eat some breakfast. It's so annoying that my family thinks I have "the death touch" when it comes to the kitchen. It's not my fault the toaster hates me.

After eating breakfast, it was time for morning practice (or regular morning practice, in my case). We mediated, did some stretches, performed some katas. Nothing out of the ordinary. The first sparring match was between Raph and Mikey. Raph was doing his typical "I'm a tough guy" routine by mocking Mikey and saying he was going to make Mikey taste the floor. Mikey, on the other hand, said nothing and only had an annoyed look on his face. He didn't say a single joke, meme, quip, observation, or anything. It was bizarre.

Raph rushed towards Mikey and Mikey only dodged. This happened three more times until Raph started to get frustrated. And when Raph got frustrated, you knew something bad was going to happen. Raph almost stabbed me in the shoulder a couple of years ago because he was so frustrated. Raph started yelling at Mikey, telling him to fight like a man, but Mikey said nothing. In fact, he actually turned his back on Raph, completely shunning him. Raph was about to snap. He roughly grabbed Mikey's arm and Mikey ended up performing a backflip kick to the back of Raph's head, knocking him down.

I immediately got flashbacks to our fight with Kasai, where he took me down with the exact same kick. It almost gave me a panic attack. Both Donnie and Sensei were just as shocked as me when Mikey delivered that kick. It took Raph a few seconds to get up and when he did, he continued to run his mouth.

"Wow, the wimp can finally fight. Only took you 15 years to grow a set. So what, you gonna do something or you gonna stand there like the retard you've always been." said Raph.

Raph definitely crossed a line there because Mikey kicked him hard in his previously injured leg, causing Raph to fall down in pain. We were taught from an early age that exploiting an injury in a fight was wrong and dishonorable. The fact that Mikey did such a low thing right in front of Sensei with zero remorse on his face made me worried. And just when I thought it couldn't get worse, Mikey ran towards Raph and rammed the side of his knee to the back of Raph's head, knocking him legitimately unconscious. Sensei immediately stopped the match and we all checked on Raph. Mikey looked at Raph for a moment before leaving the dojo. Concerned, I went after Mikey and demanded to know why he did what he did.

"Mikey, what is going on with you? Why the hell did you do that?" I asked.

"Why shouldn't I have done that?" replied Mikey.

"Why shouldn't you have…Mikey, YOU KNOCKED RAPHAEL UNCONSCIOUS. YOUR OWN BROTHER! That is not okay!" I yelled.

"He had it coming! He made 15 years of my life hell! Constantly calling me stupid, ugly, brainless, mentally handicapped, a liability! He bullied me on a regular basis and none of you did a damn thing about it! As far as Raph goes, FUCK HIM! I'm going out." Mikey said in angry tears before leaving the lair.

It seemed like Mikey was holding in a lot of rage and today was the day that things finally boiled over. I wish I'd seen it sooner, but selfish me focused more on being a good leader than being a good brother. All because Sensei wants to groom me into taking his place one day.

"God, I hate being the leader." I thought to myself.

I went back inside the dojo and told Sensei that I was going to go after Mikey. He nodded and I left the lair soon after.

After searching the rooftops for a bit, I finally spotted him walking inside a large skyscraper. I was very confused, so I took a closer look and saw that he was with a girl, who looked no older than April. He was crying and she pulled him into a hug, which calmed him down.

"Who the heck is that girl? And how does Mikey know her?" I thought to myself.

Once I saw Mikey's sad face, my heart broke into a million pieces. I wanted to go inside the building and give Mikey the biggest hug I could ever give. But I couldn't. I didn't know who that girl was and I've developed some trust issues, since going up to the surface. So, I watched from a distance and stealthily made my way back to the lair.

"He'll tell me when he's ready." I thought to myself, realizing that inserting myself into Mikey's personal business will only cause more problems.

Later That Night

I told my family that I was going on a solo mission, but in reality, I really wanted to see Karai. Yes, I know, she's the Shredder's daughter and we're going to end up like Romeo & Juliet, aka DEAD. But I didn't care. I cared about her and wanted to know more about her. So, I left the lair and went up to the surface.

If was one positive to being a ninja, it was rooftop running. It's the most exhilarating thing you can imagine. Jumping across rooftops almost makes you feel like you're flying. Anyway, I stopped at a random rooftop and I saw Karai on the opposite rooftop. She was on phone with someone, probably her Dad. Once she hung up the phone, something unexpected happened.

A guy just teleported out of thin air onto the same rooftop as Karai. I recognized him right away. It was John Kasai. He walked up to Karai with a pissed-off look on his face. And their confrontation was one I will never forget.

"I warned you. I FUCKING warned you." John said intensely.

"It's not my fault she's the daughter of a QUITTER." replied Karai.

"I left on my own terms! Your dad allowed me to leave the Clan peacefully. How would he feel to know that you tried to kill his goddaughter?!" said John.

"Don't know and don't care. Besides, you know I would kill her in a heartbeat." Karai said with a devilish smile on her face.

"I dare you. I DARE YOU TO TRY SOMETHING, YOU STUPID FUCKING CUNT!" John yelled.

Karai punched John right in the jaw and John retaliated by punching her square in the face. He then pushed her to the ground, got down on one knee, and started punching her in the face repeatedly. At this point, I had enough and jumped to the opposite rooftop, where I pulled John off Karai. Karai then quickly threw a smoke bomb off the ground and disappeared.

"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING? YOU LET HER GET AWAY!" John yelled at me.

"Why the hell were you attacking her away? She's a teenager, for God's sake!" I responded.

"MOTHERFUCKER, SHE TRIED TO KILL MY DAUGHTER! ANYONE WHO TRIES THAT SHIT DESERVES DEATH!" John continued to yell.

"Okay, I can understand your anger. My father would do the same thing if any of my brothers were killed, but you need to calm down. More anger isn't going to get us anywhere." I said.

John began to calm down and he said, "You're right. It wouldn't get us anywhere. The name's John by the way."

"Leo." I said.

"Leo? Holy shit, you're Mikey's oldest brother. I remember you. I made fun of your dumb space cartoon." said John.

"And you broke my freaking arm." I said with an irritated look on my face.

"Oh yeah, um, sorry about that. I was in a psychotic rage I couldn't control." John said awkwardly.

"Yeah and…wait a minute, how the heck do you know Mikey?" I asked.

"He saved my daughter from a Foot Clan attack about a month ago. Really nice kid." said John.

"So that's who Mikey was with earlier today? It all made sense now." I thought to myself.

"Um, so Leo, you want to talk more at my place? Mikey's over there right now if you want to see him. I also got snacks if you were interested." John offered.

I thought about his offer for a bit. Ignoring his rage, he seemed like a genuinely decent guy. If Mikey could trust him, why can't I? Granted, there was the "Bradford incident", but this guy looked a lot more trustworthy than Bradford ever did. Also, there was free food. I couldn't reject that, so I accepted his offer.

"Awesome." said John.

Just as I was about to run in the direction of the skyscraper, he stopped me and asked, "What are you doing?"

"Going to the skyscraper." I responded.

"Dude, you'll waste 15 minutes getting there. I have a much quicker solution and all you have to do is hold my hand." John said before holding out his hand.

I looked at him like he was crazy and said, "What?"

"Hold my hand." said John.

"You sure?" I asked.

"Just do it." John said with a slightly annoyed tone.

Shrugging my shoulders, I grabbed his hand and he told me "I'm just going to warn you now. This is going to feel very weird, but you'll get used to it."

"Wait, what?" I asked before we suddenly teleported off the rooftop and we ended up in Kasai's living room. The feeling of teleporting from one area to another caused me to freak out and have a bit of a panic attack.

Mikey and the girl he was with earlier saw me and Mikey said, "Leo? What are you doing here?"

"I…got…teleported here… by…Kasai." I said through panicked breaths.

"Yeah, it wasn't that fun for me either. But just breathe, okay. In and out." said Mikey.

After a few seconds of breathing in and out, my panic attack was gone and John looked at me with a guilty look on his face.

"Sorry about that. Not everyone can handle the feeling of teleportation the first time. Hell, I freaked the fuck out the first time I teleported." said John.

"It's fine. I just want to know who the heck is standing next to Mikey." I said.

"That would be my daughter, Kate. Kate, this is Leonardo, Mikey's oldest brother." said John.

Kate came up to me and said, "Nice to meet you, Leo. Mikey has told me all about you and all the stress you go through. It sounds pretty awful. Makes me glad I'm an only child."

"Nice to meet you too." I said before seeing an older woman standing next to John.

"This is my wife, Susan. Susan, this is Mikey's oldest brother, Leonardo." said John.

"Well Leonardo, it's very nice to meet you. Please don't call me Mrs. Kasai or Kate's mom. It makes me feel older than I really am." Susan said.

"Okay. So, now what?" I asked.

"Well, I could tell you my story and then you tell me yours." said John.

"Alright then. Tell me your story." I said.

After listening to John's story, I was amazed by what I heard. He was with the Foot for 21 years, longer than I've been alive, or mutated. He was directly involved in our mutation, which sort of makes him our semi-creator. He's been a mutant for 8 years and had powers like teleportation and FREAKING FLIGHT and he ended up leaving the Foot because he felt awful about how he decimated my family. He even showed me an admittedly cool picture of him with the Foot Clan that was taken last year.

When I told John about the origin story our father told us for years, he unexpectedly asked me to speak with him in private. We entered John's bedroom and what he said to me changed my world forever.

"Okay Leo, I need you to make sure you keep this PRIVATE. Don't even tell Mikey what I'm about to tell you, at least not yet. He might not take it well. Got it?" said John.

"Um, okay? What's this all about?" I asked.

"It's about your origin story." said John.

"What about it?" I replied.

John took a deep breath and said, "Leo, I hate to tell you this, I really do, but…that story is a lie."

I actually laughed at John's statement and said, "You can't be serious. You have to be joking."

"Leo, I'm being dead serious. Your father is lying to you. None of those events actually happened. Saki never murdered Tang Shen and Yoshi never married Tang Shen." John said with a serious look on his face.

"What…what are you talking about? Sensei told us that Tang Shen chose him over Saki and Saki tried to kill Yoshi out of jealousy." I said.

John then walked over to a dresser and grabbed a photo. He gave it to me and said, "Explain this then."

The photo was Saki and Tang Shen kissing at a wedding ceremony and both were wearing wedding outfits. Part of me thought it was fake, maybe Photoshop or some really good editing tool. But another part of me thought it looked way too real to be fake. I honestly didn't know what to think.

"They were married for 8 years. Shen became pregnant on their 8th year together and the two had Karai 9 months later. But you want to know the twisted part about it?" said John.

"What?" I asked with uncertainty.

"Saki was never the father. Yoshi was. Turns out she was sleeping with Yoshi behind Saki's back. And Yoshi NEVER TOLD SAKI THIS. When Saki found out, he went to Yoshi's house to finish him off. Their fight resulted in the whole house burning down and during their fight, Yoshi threw a knife at Saki, only for it to hit Tang Shen, killing her. Saki then grabbed Karai and left the house. That's the real story. Yoshi is responsible for this war, not Saki." said John.

I couldn't believe it. Sensei…my father…the man who raised me since my mutation, lied to me. He lied to me my whole life. I always knew he was hiding some type of secret, but I never thought it would be this. Everything he said about being an honorable ninja was bullshit. He screwed up all of our lives.

All I could do was sit on John's bed, trying to take in all the information without having a breakdown. John put his hand on my shell and comforted me.

"I know it's a lot to take in, but trust me, things will get better. All I'm going to tell you is that none of this is your fault. You and your brothers aren't guilty of anything. Your father is at fault here. He's the one who manipulated you into thinking Saki was the enemy. Okay?" said John.

"Okay." I said with tears threatening to come out of my eyes.

"Remember, you can always talk to me. My schedule is wide open." John said before giving me a hug. And I'm glad he did that because I really needed a hug from someone.

After that talk, I could never look at my father the same way again.

Over the next few weeks, I decided to make some changes. If Sensei wanted me to be "the perfect son", then I would do anything to destroy that version of myself. Since Mikey and I both knew John, we spent a lot more time together and I really enjoyed being with him. We played video games, watched crappy B-movies, and I even helped Mikey out with his pranks. It made me wish we hung out with each other a lot sooner.

Whenever we were at John's house, Mikey hung out with Kate, while I talked to John about any personal problems I was dealing with. The advice he gave stuck with me and I started to use it on a regular basis.

On a random day in the lair, Raph was in one of his moods and he was insulting Mikey. Guess that knee to the back of his head didn't change him at all. It didn't help that recently his pet turtle, Spike, fell into mutagen, turning him into Slash. Slash beat the crap out of all of us and ran away from the lair. I know it broke Raph's heart, but it didn't give him any excuse to treat Mikey like garbage. So, I got in front of Raph and told him to back off. Predictably, Raph didn't listen and started insulting me by calling me Lame-o-nardo, Boy Scout, Teacher's Pet, Mr. Perfection, and all sorts of colorful things. He continued to do it until I thought of John's words.

"Stop letting Raph push you around. If he's going to treat you like trash, then give him a taste of his own medicine."

I decided I had enough of Raph's attitude and I slapped him across the face, to the shock of my brothers and Sensei. Even Raph was surprised. I took that moment to viciously taunt him.

"What's the matter Raph? You mad that the Boy Scout gave you what you deserve? Are you gonna cry? Are you going to cry like the weak, insecure bitch that you are?" I said.

"LEONARDO!" Sensei yelled, but I ignored him.

Raph ended up tackling me to the ground and we fought each other until Mikey and Donnie pulled us apart from each other.

"Leonardo, what is this behavior? I expected better from you." said Sensei. John's words came to mind at that moment.

"I usually don't condone this but be as disrespectful as possible to your father. You're no longer going to be his golden child."

"Fuck off, Sensei." I said with contempt.

Everyone went silent. It was so silent you could hear a pin drop. Raph and Donnie's eyes widened because they never thought I would say that to Sensei.

"What did you say?" asked Sensei.

"You heard me. Fuck. Off." I said with a smirk on my face, before giving him the double bird and walking out of the lair.

Soon after that, I began to further antagonize Sensei. I would talk back to him, openly insult him in front of my brothers, and I even used a banned martial arts technique (the Death Dragon) against Raph in a sparring match. Once I performed the technique, I looked right at Sensei's face with a look that basically said, "Yep, I just used Shredder's move right in front of you. What are you gonna do about it?"

Eventually, I used John's advice whenever I was on the surface, fighting the Foot and the Purple Dragons. I stopped having feelings for Karai because one, she's Yoshi's daughter, and two, that technically makes her my sister, which really makes me regret every time I had a wet dream about her. Hey, don't get mad at me, I'm a teenager! My hormones are supposed to be going wild. It's not like I knew we were nonbiologically related. Anyway, during one of our usual fights with the Purple Dragons, John's words came to mind again.

"The only way this war is going to end is if you stop thinking like a hero. You need to quit letting your enemies run away. Don't slap them on the wrist, break their wrist."

When one of the Purple Dragons swung a bat at my head, I grabbed it and kicked him in the stomach, before hitting them in the face with the bat. When he fell down, I knew what I needed to do in order for the Purple Dragons to never fuck with me or my family again. I looked at the bat in my hand and began to hit the Purple Dragon in the leg with it. I hit him again and again and again, no doubt causing permanent damage to his leg. His screams fell on deaf ears as I continued to hit him.

By the time I was done, all of the other Purple Dragons looked at me like I was the devil incarnate and ran away like there was no tomorrow. I dropped the bat and looked at the fallen Purple Dragon, who had tears running down his face and it also looked like he pissed himself. I highly doubt he'll ever mess with me ever again. And if he does, he'll regret it.

Sensei would have called my actions dishonorable, but I didn't care. He's the last person who should be talking about honor. If there's one important thing that John taught me, it's this…

"In war, honor means nothing. It's worthless. You either survive or you die. MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE."

And by meeting Kasai, I knew I made the right choice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it for Chapter 7. So, how did you like my portrayals of Mikey and Leo? I didn't want to make Mikey a complete idiot, so I decided to give him a more mature side, while still keeping his fun, positive personality. When it comes to Leo, I pretty much threw his responsible Leader persona in the trash. The biggest issue I had with Leo throughout most of his incarnations is that his personability boils down to "I'm the leader. I'm the serious one." Instead of doing that, I've made him more outgoing, arrogant, and a bit of a prick. Out of all the turtles, Leo will have the closest relationship with John. The next chapter will be from the perspectives of Raph and Donnie, who have also been doing some secretive stuff. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.


	8. Red And Purple

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter will be from the POV of Raph and Donnie. Raph's personality is more or less the same as his other incarnations (minus Rise), while Donnie's personality has been altered slightly. Apriltello and Rasey will be on full display, so I better not see any overly toxic fans swarming this chapter. Enjoy.

Raph's POV

May 11, 2013

"FUCK!" I yelled at the top of my lungs as I lost another round of Mortal Kombat: Deception to Mr. Perfection himself, Leo. I lost the fight in the most bullshit way possible too, by getting kicked into a freaking death-trap. When the hell did Leo get so good at video games anyway?

"I told you this game was unpredictable, but you didn't want to listen." Leo said with a stupid, smug grin on his face. God, I wanted to smack him.

"Shut up, Fearless. At least, I'm not playing as a Shredder knock-off." I said.

"It's not like I made the decision to turn Sub-Zero into the Shredder. I'm more surprised Shredhead never sued Midway for copyright." said Leo.

We played another round until I lost again. At that point, I was done. I threw the controller down on the beanbag and walked to my room.

"Come on, Raph! Don't be a sore loser!" Leo said, but I ignored him.

I entered my room, closed the door, and sat on my bed. God, Leo was seriously getting on my nerves. I don't know what happened to Leo but I don't like it at all. He's transformed from dork to douchebag. And it came completely out of left field. It was like a switch flip or something.

Even worse, he's been treating Sensei like complete garbage recently. Now look, I've never been a big fan of every decision Sensei has made. Not naming me leader ranks #1 on "Sensei's Bad Decision Making" list. Still, I've never openly insulted Sensei to his face because I know he would drop my ass real quick. But Leo? He recently called Sensei a gesuyarou, which the Japanese word for "asshole".

Yes, you heard me right. Leo, the Boy Scout. The one who never wanted to get into trouble. The one who kissed Sensei's ass relentlessly. That Leo called Sensei an asshole. It's like I woke up in a whole another dimension where Leo is a worse version of me.

Not only that, Mikey's been acting really weird too. Now, Mikey has always been a weirdo. That's not me being a jerk, that's me stating a fact. But in the past few weeks, it's…it's like I don't even recognize him anymore. He's been eating healthy food, he cleaned his room, he's been focusing super hard on training, and he's even kicked my ass in sparring matches. NONE OF THIS MAKES ANY FUCKING SENSE! Did the real Mikey get kidnapped by the Kraang and they gave us a robot Mikey that acted nothing like the real Mikey?! It's probably farfetched but I wouldn't be surprised.

Anyway, while Leo and Mikey acted like the complete opposite of themselves, I've spent a lot of my time hanging out with Donnie and talking to Casey on the phone.

For the longest time, I thought Donnie was nothing but a geek who refused to fight. Always coming up with excuses to not hurt or fight anyone. All he wanted to do was focus on his toys and spew a bunch of technobabble at all of us, having a "I'm smart and you're dumb" type of attitude. It didn't help that his main weapon was a wooden stick, while the rest of us had far more useful weapons.

But after hearing what happened in his fight with that John Kasai asshole, I was impressed. More than impressed, actually. In fact, it made me change my view of Donnie. I didn't see him as a pussy anymore. I saw him as a legitimate badass. I started hanging out with him more and we developed some really strong chemistry with each other. My chemistry with Donnie was stronger than it ever was with Leo. We surprisingly had some of the same interests, including professional wrestling, which Leo and Mikey were indifferent to. Donnie liked the storytelling part of it, while I liked the athleticism. We had a blast watching WWE and it made us closer as brothers.

And then there's Casey.

Ever since we met, me and Casey have been the best of friends. "Two peas in a pod" as Mikey would say. We had similar attitudes, fighting styles, interests, senses of humor, you name it. Casey was the human counterpart I've always wanted. But then something changed. My feelings for him changed. They didn't turn negative or anything like that, but they became…deeper. The two of us had a "ride together, die together" type of friendship and we were cool with that. But I wanted our friendship to go a bit…further, you know?

(Sigh) You know what, I might as well rip off the band-aid. I, Raphael Hamato, am gay. No, I didn't stutter. I'm gay. I like guys. I like dicks. How much more blatant could I possibly be? So not only am I a freak of nature, but I'm a gay freak of nature because that clearly makes things so much better.

Now I know what you're thinking. Raph? Gay? This can't be! Raph is the most masculine of his brothers! He may be green, but he's no fruit! I thought the same thing for the longest time. I watched porn, read Playboy magazines, looked up pictures of girls in bikinis. I did EVERYTHING I could to convince myself I was straight. But for some god-forsaken reason, Casey FUCKING Jones brought out the gay in me.

It took me months to come out to Casey. Every time I tried to tell Casey, some voice in my head told me to stop because if I told Casey, our friendship would die. This voice continued to haunt me until I finally told that voice to "FUCK OFF" and I decided I would do it. I would tell Casey that I was gay. I texted Casey to meet me on a rooftop and eventually, we did just that. And let me tell you, it was the most stressful thing I've ever done. It made me wish that I was fighting the Shredder because at least I wouldn't have to worry about my best friend rejecting me. I remember the whole encounter like it was yesterday.

Flashback: January 18, 2013

"So Raph, what made you want to meet with the one and only Casey Jones?" asked Casey.

God, Casey had an ego of God-like proportions. He even talked in the third-person, like he was The Rock or something.

"Casey, there's…there's something I need to tell you." I said.

Casey knew he needed to get serious and said, "What's going on? Is it something with the family?"

"No, everything's fine back at the lair. It's specifically about me." I said.

"Okay, well, what is it?" asked Casey.

"Casey, I…I don't know how to tell you this, but I'm…I'm gay." I whispered the last part like I was ashamed of it.

"Can you repeat that because I couldn't hear you." said Casey.

"I'm gay." I said a little louder, but still not loud enough for Casey to hear.

"Dude, speak up. What's up with you? You've never acted this shy before. Whatever it is you got to say, just say it!" Casey said loudly.

Preparing myself for the worst, I closed my eyes tightly and yelled, "I'M GAY, OKAY!"

At that moment, I was legitimately terrified. I just told my best friend something I'd never told my family because I was afraid of ridicule and rejection. It's bad enough I'm a psychotic hothead, but to add the fact that I was into guys, made everything worse.

"And I love you, Casey." I said with a softer tone.

When I opened my eyes, I thought Casey would've run away, called me a slur, cut all ties with me, or anything of that nature. Instead, he looked at me with a look that wasn't out of hate or disgust. It was out of kindness and support.

"I've kept this to myself for months because I thought you would ditch me or call me a faggot or something." I said.

"What?! Dude, I would NEVER call you that! I wouldn't ditch you for anything. We ride together and die together, man. That will never change." said Casey.

"You sure?" I asked.

"100% sure, Raph. And I know this is a sloppy segue, but I've had feelings for you too." said Casey.

"Really? You? Casey Jones? I thought you were a ladies' man." I said.

"Yeah, I'm into both dudes and chicks. I'm bisexual, or bi, if you want to get technical." said Casey.

"Wow. I never knew that." I said.

"I didn't tell anyone about it until a few months ago when I told my dad." said Casey.

"How did that go?" I asked.

"He was shocked but after a day or two, he told me he was cool with it and he would love me no matter what. As of this moment, you and my dad are the only people who know about this." said Casey.

"So far, you're the only person who knows I'm gay. I don't even want to imagine talking to Sensei or my brothers about this." I said.

"Why?" asked Casey.

"Why? Well for starters, my brothers would make jokes about me nonstop. I know we joke about each other all the time, but I don't know if I'm comfortable with them joking about me being gay. And Sensei, he's very traditional and I don't think he would react very well to one of his sons being a "homosexual"." I said.

"That's understandable. I think your brothers will take the news far better than your dad, but I think they'll all accept you for who you are. I mean, they're not bothered with being mutants, so why would they be bothered with you being gay?" said Casey.

"You got a point, but I'm not ready to talk to them yet. Maybe soon, but definitely not now. Especially, when we're dealing with Shredder and the Kraang." I said.

"True. So, you want to be a "thing"?" asked Casey.

"Hell yeah. You?" I replied.

"Hell yeah, man." said Casey.

The two of us hugged and we both went back home.

(End Of Flashback)

And that was that. Me and Casey were officially a couple. We mainly hung out at Casey's place because I knew if we hung out at the lair, my brothers, particularly Mikey, would stick their noses into our business. Because fuck privacy, am I right?

As a couple, me and Casey didn't have our first kiss until 2 weeks ago. We were playing Mortal Kombat 9 and after beating the story mode together, I got so hyped that I kissed Casey on the lips. The next few seconds that followed were the most horribly awkward seconds in history. We just stared at each other, while my face was red in embarrassment.

"Heh. Sorry about that, Casey. I guess I got a little too excited." I said with embarrassment on my face.

"Dude, you don't need to apologize. You want to do it again, properly this time?" asked Casey.

"Sure." I said.

We slowly got closer to each other and eventually, our lips touched and it was the weirdest feeling I've ever felt. Never in my life did I ever think I would kiss someone on the lips. But here I was, kissing my best friend-turned-boyfriend.

After a while, we stopped and all I could say was, "Wow."

"I know. Great feeling, right? Although this isn't my first rodeo, it is the first time I've kissed a mutant, so that's an achievement." said Casey.

"Who else did you kiss?" I asked.

"I was in a relationship two years ago with a girl named Irma. She was one of April's friends. The furthest we got was the kissing stage and after that, it just didn't work out. I was busy with hockey, she was busy with journalism stuff, and we broke up." said Casey.

"Damn. That sucks." I said.

"Yeah, but I'm kind of glad it happened because if I never broke up with her, I never would've met you or your brothers." said Casey.

"True." I said.

After that, we played more video games, had a wrestling match, and had a make-out session on the couch. I ended up staying the night at his place, so me and Casey slept together in his bed. We didn't do anything dirty if that's what you're thinking. Thankfully, Casey's dad left for work super early in the morning, so I was able to sneak out without any issues. Well, that's not entirely true because Casey's 7-year-old sister, Robyn, caught me leaving. I'm honestly surprised she didn't scream at the sight of me.

"Are you the guy Casey's been talking to?" she asked.

I knew I was busted and said, "Yeah, I'm the guy."

"So, are you his boyfriend?" she asked.

I sighed and said, "Yeah."

"Okay. Well, I'm glad that you've made my brother happy." she innocently said.

"No problem." I said before climbing out the window.

That was a few weeks ago and now we've been planning on how we're going to tell Casey's dad. Casey's dad already knew that his son was bisexual, but he had no idea his son was hanging out with mutants on a regular basis, not to mention being in a relationship with one. I pulled out my T-phone and we texted each other for a good 10 minutes on how we were going to pull this off and we both decided that we would do it tonight.

I got up off my bed and looked over to the box that used to be Spike's bed. Awful memories came flooding back. It tore me to shreds when Spike got mutated and attacked me and my family. I cried in my room for 3 days after the attack. Spike was my pet for 10 years and I loved him to death. And now he was gone. Life really wanted to fuck me over that day.

I felt tears running down my face as I thought about Spike. I grabbed my old childhood teddy bear, brought it close to my plastron, and hugged it tightly. I used my teddy bear whenever I had nightmares about scientists dissecting me or my family abandoning me because of my anger issues. That teddy bear prevented me from having some incredibly dark and potentially life-ending thoughts.

"Hey Raph, April's here!" yelled Mikey.

I quickly wiped away the tears from my face, put the teddy bear back on my bed, and left my room. I walked to the common area, where April was standing next to Donnie.

"Hi Raph!" said April.

"Hey April." I said with a dejected tone.

April quickly caught on to my tone and asked, "You okay? You don't sound like yourself."

"I'm fine. It's just that I was thinking about what happened to Spike, that's all." I said.

"Aww. It really sucks what happened to him. Hopefully, you can find him again." said April.

"Yeah, I hope so too." I said.

For the next few hours, April hung out with all of us, but I noticed that she was particularly close to Donnie. I always knew Donnie had intense feelings for April. He's had them since the second he saw April. But it looked like April shared those feelings too because while we were watching The Hunger Games, she asked Donnie if she could sit on his lap. Yeah, that actually happened. And of course, Donnie said "Yes", and she sat right on his lap. They were throwing popcorn into each other's mouths and I even saw them touch each other's hands at one point. That's not something friends do. But I didn't want to throw out accusations, so I stayed silent.

After the movie was over, I told everyone I was "going out" and no one tried to stop me. They were just like, "Okay, bye. Stay safe." So, I left the lair, found the nearest manhole cover, opened it, made my way to the surface, and went straight to Casey's place.

Once I got there, I tapped on the window outside Casey's bedroom and he let me in soon after.

"Okay, so what's the plan?" I asked.

"You stay in my room, while I go in the living room to talk to my dad. Once I give him enough information, I'll let you know when to come out. Got it?" said Casey.

"Got it." I said.

"Good because I don't want to screw this up." said Casey.

"Neither do I." I said.

"Okay, now stay here." Casey said before leaving his room.

To make sure I didn't mess up my cue, I walked right up to the door and opened it ever so slightly. That way I could watch and hear everything.

I watched Casey walk up to his dad, who was on a recliner drinking a beer, and I quietly said, "Okay, here goes everything."

"Uh, Dad?" asked Casey.

"Yeah, son?" replied Mr. Jones.

"There's something I need to tell you." said Casey.

"Okay. What do you want to tell me?" asked Mr. Jones.

"Um, you've heard about mutants, right?" asked Casey.

"Yeah, the guys at my job talk about them." said Mr. Jones.

"And you know there are these rumors of masked vigilantes fighting criminals and gang members?" asked Casey.

"Yeah. Why do you ask?" replied Mr. Jones.

"Well, I…might know these masked vigilantes and we've been fighting crime together." Casey said sheepishly.

"WHAT?! SINCE WHEN?" Mr. Jones said with anger and surprise.

"Since last October." said Casey.

Mr. Jones got up out of his recliner and said, "CASEY, YOU CAN'T HIDE SHIT LIKE THIS FROM ME! YOU CAN'T BE FIGHTING CRIMINALS! YOU'RE A TEENAGER!"

"I know but I've met these guys and they're so freaking cool. They're highly trained ninjas. And…I'm in a relationship with one of them." said Casey.

"WHAT?! YOU'RE IN ANOTHER RELATIONSHIP AND YOU DIDN'T TELL ME?!" replied Mr. Jones.

"Dad, please, just calm down. I can explain everything, but you need to promise me to not go berserk. Okay?" said Casey.

Mr. Jones calmed down a bit and said, "Okay. I'll let you talk."

"Alright. RAPH! You can come out now." said Casey.

"This is it." I thought to myself before leaving Casey's room and walking right to the living room. When I revealed myself to Casey's dad, he looked like he was about to have a heart attack. He actually fell back down in his recliner and stared at me with disbelief.

"Dad, this is my boyfriend, Raphael Hamato. Raph, this is my dad." said Casey.

"Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Jones." I said before extending my hand to him.

Casey's dad nervously shook my hand and said, "So, you're a turtle?"

"A teenage mutant ninja turtle to be more precise." I replied.

"And you've known my son for how long?" asked Mr. Jones.

"Since October. We met by beating the crap out of each other. He had a large ego, I had anger issues, and neither of us were going down without a fight. After the fight, we respected each other and grew to like each other. I introduced him to my family, we spent time beating up criminal scum on the streets, and eventually, I had to tell Casey my true feelings about him. So, I told Casey I was gay, he told me he was bisexual, and right then and there, we became a thing." I said.

I then gave Casey's dad more context on what exactly we've been doing since October. You know, meeting April, fighting the Foot Clan, stopping alien threats, all that good stuff. After telling Casey's dad the whole story, the only thing he could do was put his hands on his head, trying to process everything he just heard. And I can't imagine it would be very easy to do so because it's a shit-ton of information.

After about a minute or so, Casey's dad stood up and simply said, "Casey, leave the room. I need to talk to Raphael. ALONE."

"But Dad…" said Casey.

"GO. NOW." Mr. Jones said with so much authority in his voice that it caused Casey to quickly hightail it out of the room.

Casey's dad then looked at me dead in the eye and said, "Look, Raphael, I…"

"Raph. I prefer to go by Raph." I said, interrupting him.

"Look Raph, I don't know you. I don't know anything about this "war" you're fighting. I don't know anything about your family life, your issues, your hopes and dreams, or anything like that. It's likely that anything I don't know, Casey knows. And from what I've heard, it's clear you two care deeply about each other. You'd give your lives for each other. But…it's just that…a few years ago, Casey's mother, my wife, died from cancer. It's been hard for Casey and especially hard for me. And because he's involved in all this chaos, I'm afraid that I'll lose him too and the very last thing I want is to lose one of my children." said Mr. Jones.

Casey never really told me about his home life but hearing how Casey's mom died of cancer broke my heart. It seemed that a lack of a mother figure was an unfortunate trait that me, my brothers, Casey, and April all had.

"But after hearing about your battles, I know I can trust you to protect Casey. You'll protect each other in ways that I never could. So, I approve of your relationship with my son." said Mr. Jones as he smiled and extended his hand to me.

I had such a huge smile on my face when I shook his hand. Casey's dad would no longer be an issue. The only issue I had now was telling my family and I was not looking forward to that conversation.

"Thank you, Mr. Jones." I said.

Just as I was about to leave, Casey's dad held my hand tightly and pulled me forward.

"But, if you do anything that hurts my son, physically or emotionally, I will deshell your ass and turn you into turtle soup. Understand?" Mr. Jones said in a threatening tone.

"Yes, sir." I said, trying to sound confident, even though I was somewhat terrified.

"Good." Mr. Jones said before letting go of my hand.

I left the room and found Casey in the kitchen.

"So, what did he say? Is he cool with us?" asked Casey.

"Yeah, he's cool with us." I said with a smile.

"Awesome!" Casey said before we embraced in a hug. It was one of the better days of my life.

Two Days Later

Me and Casey were in the lair, trying to whip each other's asses in WWE SmackDown! Here Comes The Pain, until we heard April coming into the lair.

"Hey guys!" said April.

"Hey April!" everyone said in unison. Everyone except Donnie.

"Hi April." Donnie said with his signature nervous laugh, showcasing the gap in his teeth.

"Hi Donnie." April said, also with a nervous laugh. The way they looked at each other was so weird. I even saw the two of them blushing. I knew something was going on between those two.

Donnie and April quickly walked to Donnie's lab and I asked, "And where are you two lovebirds going?"

"One, we're not lovebirds. And two, we're going inside my lab, so I can help April study." said Donnie.

"Why can't you do it out here? Why does it have to be in your lab?" I asked.

"Hmm, I don't know. Maybe it's because YOU WON'T STOP ASKING ME QUESTIONS." Donnie said with a very annoyed tone.

"Don't listen to him, Donnie. He just wants to get under your skin. We're going to be in Donnie's lab for a while. DON'T INTERRUPT US." April said before she and Donnie walked inside the lab and closed the door.

Me and Casey then looked at each other and I said, "You thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Yeah, man. Let's spy on them." said Casey.

The two of us stealthily made our way to the outside of Donnie's lab and opened the door ever so slightly. When we both took a peek inside, we couldn't believe what we were seeing.

Donnie was making out with April.

And their kissing wasn't the innocent type. It was the hot, passionate type of kissing. I think I even saw some tongue action.

We slowly closed the door and Casey had his hand over his mouth.

"Dude, I knew it. I had a feeling she was into Donnie." Casey whispered.

"Yeah, me too. We should probably keep quiet about this. I don't want to mess things up for them." I whispered.

"Good idea because they look pretty satisfied to me." Casey whispered.

It all seemed surreal. It hadn't even been a year since we went to the surface and it feels like we've all changed. I know change can be a good thing but…I had a feeling that things were about to get a lot crazier. And not particularly in a good way.

Donnie's POV

June 22, 2013

I couldn't believe it. It was now the 6-month anniversary of my relationship with the girl I love, April O'Neil.

By all accounts of logic, none of this should've been possible. The chances of this happening would've been at least 1 in a trillion. The universe should've prevented this from ever-existing at all.

But I proved the entire universe wrong.

I proved my brothers wrong, I proved my father wrong, I proved Casey wrong, I proved EVERYONE wrong about how a freak of nature like myself could never get the girl of his dreams.

And DAMN, did it feel good.

I remember the first time I met April. It wasn't exactly a pleasant experience. She and her father were about to get abducted by the Kraang until me and my brothers came in to save them…to the best of our, at the time, limited ability. When I caught her from falling over in the scuffle, she screamed, which made me scream in response. Keep in mind, this was our first time above the surface and we had ZERO experience when it came to interacting with humans. But after we stopped screaming, I saw a very scared look in her eyes and I knew I had to convince her I wasn't a threat. So, I put on my best "I'm not going to hurt you" face and told her, "It's okay". And for a brief second, she had this look on her face that said, "I think I trust this guy. Even if he is a turtle."

After that, a bunch of stuff went down and I don't feel like going through everything beat-by-beat, so I'll just give you the CliffsNotes version of what happened next. We failed miserably, she and her father got abducted, we fought more Kraang, we managed to save them and as a result, we earned their trust and they became our first human allies.

April hung out with us in the lair on a regular basis. She liked talking to my brothers and Sensei, but she REALLY preferred talking to me. After all, I was the first to meet her. It turned out she was smart. Like, REALLY smart. Just as smart as me, in fact. We would spend hours talking about scientific formulas, mathematics, physics, and all types of things. It felt great to talk to someone who actually knew what I was talking about.

Things didn't start getting serious between us until I asked her out on a date. Of course, I was a nervous wreck when it came to asking her out. I even made a whole chart plan about all the possible ways I could get April to hang out with me. In hindsight, it was incredibly creepy and if I was a human, I would get arrested on the spot, so I'm glad I never actually used it. Anyway, I called April and asked her if she wanted to go out with me. And when she said "Yes", my heart exploded out of happiness and excitement. Right after the phone call ended, I jumped up and down around my lab, like a kid on Christmas morning.

Unfortunately, a few hours after that, I had to deal with Kasai, and…yeah, that wasn't a very good night for me or my family. On one hand, Kasai kicked all our asses and he broke some of my ribs with a steel pipe. Not to mention he gave April a broken tailbone. But on the other hand, I did make him bleed and I was closest out of anyone to take him down by using a triangle choke on him. So, I'm proud of myself for that.

April and I did have our date one week later, injuries and all. We met up on top of her apartment building, brought out some chairs, and sat down and talked. We were both taped up due to our injuries, so we were limited on what we could do. But we still had a nice evening together and things only went up from there.

Our first date led to the second. Then the third. Then the fourth. Then the fifth.

By the time we had our sixth date, it was right around Christmas, literally 3 days away. I wasn't able to find her a nice gift for many reasons (lack of money, living underground, being a mutant, having enemies, etc.), so I was nervous about what she would think. I didn't want to disappoint her, especially around Christmas.

But what ended up happening was better than I could've ever anticipated.

Flashback: December 22, 2012

I was on top of April's apartment building, waiting for April to show up. Our date was supposed to happen at 6 pm and now it was 6:10 pm. Admittedly, I was a little annoyed, but I was still confident she would make it.

I was about to text her and ask her where she was and, lo and behold, she finally arrived on the rooftop, completely out of breath.

"Sorry about keeping you waiting, Donnie. My aunt kept bugging me about getting her a foot massager and she WOULD NOT SHUT UP." said April.

"It's okay, April. I can relate. Sensei can go on 5-minute lectures before we leave the lair." I said.

"That has to suck. Anyway, I brought you your Christmas present. I know it's 3 days early, but after everything we've been through the past few months, I really wanted to give it to you now." said April.

In her hands was a box, wrapped in Christmas-themed wrapping paper. It was rectangular in shape, so I thought it was a book or something.

She handed me the box, I opened it, and in it was a tablet. Even better, the tablet had a turtle-like design to it.

"Wow, this is really nice, April. Thank you." I said.

"No problem, Donnie. I knew you would like it since you LOVE technology." said April.

At this moment, my smile turned upside down when I had to tell her I couldn't get her a gift.

"April, I…have something to tell you. (Sigh) I couldn't find you a gift for Christmas. And it sucks because I wanted to get you something so bad. I wanted to get you something that you would remember. Something that…" I said before April stopped me.

"Donnie, I understand." said April.

"You do?" I asked.

"Yeah, I mean, you live underground, you have little money, you have to deal with enemies on a daily basis. Not to mention that you can't simply walk into a store to buy something unless you want to be on the nightly news. So, I totally get it and I'm not mad at you if that's what you were about to ask." said April.

"Okay, well that's a relief." I said with all the worry I had quickly disappearing.

"But there is one Christmas wish I have that hasn't been fulfilled yet." said April.

"And what might that be?" I asked.

"Finding the perfect guy." said April.

It was like the Earth stopped moving for a few seconds. I simply couldn't believe what I was hearing. April O'Neil, the girl of my dreams, was basically implying that she wanted me to be her boyfriend. It was a dream come true. All the times I watched Beauty and the Beast when I was little, hoping against hope that the same thing would happen to me, had finally become reality.

"So, Donnie, do you want to be together?" asked April.

"More than anything in the whole wide world." I said.

At that moment, we kissed each other and it was the happiest moment of my life.

(End Of Flashback)

Ever since that glorious day, we've kept our relationship a secret from everyone. Well, everyone except April's father, Kirby. I guess he had some suspicions about the two of us having some type of relationship and on one random day, he caught us in the act. The whole thing was such an awkward mess that it made me want to retreat in my shell and die. Kirby yelled at us, we explained everything to him, April told him how much she loved me and without me, they would probably be imprisoned by the Kraang, I told him that I would protect her from anything, and finally, Kirby accepted our relationship and allowed us to be together. But not before threatening me if I ever broke April's heart, so that made the moment slightly less sweet.

Whenever we were in the lair, April and I spent 90% of the time in my lab because I didn't want anyone barraging in, in case I was in the middle of doing something. We would spend upwards of 5 minutes making out, while I'm sitting in my desk chair. The rest of the time we just talked about personal stuff, potential threats, and other things.

Now, it was time to celebrate our 6-month anniversary together and unlike last time, I would get April a gift that she would never forget.

The two of us were on a random rooftop and we both had a can of Sprite in our hands.

"To 6 months of being together and surviving everything that has stood in our path." I said while we raised our cans of Sprite in the air.

"Cheers!" I said.

"Cheers!" said April before we clinked our sodas together and chugged them.

"So, you have any plans for this special day?" asked April.

"I do, actually." I said before pulling a small box out of a duffle bag I was carrying around my shoulder.

"I really wanted to give you this. Think of it as a makeup gift for last Christmas." I said.

I gave her the box and when she opened it, her eyes widened. The gift I got her was a custom-made necklace, with the pendant being a metallic purple turtle shell.

"It took me a while to find the right materials to make it so I was hoping you would at least like it." I said.

"Donnie, I…I LOVE IT." said April.

Right before I could say anything, she gave me an unexpected hug and kissed me right on my beak.

"You mind putting it on me?" asked April.

"No, not at all." I said.

I put the necklace on April and she asked me, "How does it look?"

"Perfect, just like you." I answered.

"Oh Donnie." April said before she suddenly turned her head and did a double-take. It looked like she saw something…or someone.

"Is that Raph?" asked April.

I looked in her general direction and Raph was indeed near us, running across the rooftops and apparently having his own agenda.

"You know where he's going?" asked April.

"No clue. Hopefully nowhere stupid." I said before April and I decided to follow Raph.

Now you're probably saying to yourself, "Donnie, how could you spy on your own brother? Do you not trust him?" Look, I do trust my brothers, even Mikey, but Raph can be… problematic, particularly when he's angry. When he's pissed, he can make bad decisions and throw himself into situations that might be life-threatening. I really don't want Raph to fight 20 Foot Ninja all because Mikey pissed him off with a prank. So, whenever he's above the surface, we keep a close eye on him.

We followed Raph by running and jumping off rooftops. While this was no problem for me, April, on the other hand, was having more trouble. Sensei has been training her to be a Kunoichi since she first met us and while she's certainly improved, she still has ways to go before she can match our level. But she's definitely making some progress.

We kept on following Raph until he stopped at an apartment building and climbed through a window.

"Thank…God…we…stopped." April said through exhausted breaths.

"Why the heck would Raph enter this building?" I asked myself out loud.

"Wait a minute, that's…that's where Casey lives." said April.

"Really? You sure?" I asked.

"I'm positive. I've been to his apartment numerous times. He has an ADORABLE little sister and his dad is pretty nice, although the death of Casey's mom has made recent visits more…awkward." said April.

"What happened to Casey's mom?" I asked.

"She died of cancer." said April.

"Damn. That fucking sucks." I said.

April and I then stood outside the window and we eavesdropped on Raph's conversation with Casey. And the results were…unexpected, to say the least.

"So Raph, I wanted to ask you something. It's kind of stupid but…do you have a tail?" asked Casey.

"Casey, I'm a turtle. OF COURSE, I HAVE A TAIL." said Raph.

"I know, I've seen nature documentaries and stuff about turtles before. It's just that I thought it was weird you guys didn't have visible tails or anything like that." said Casey.

Raph sighed and said, "Our tails are hidden because they're incredibly sensitive and they only come out when we want them to. None of us show off our tails publicly because it would be fucking weird. But, since you're curious, I can show you what it looks like."

"Really?" asked Casey.

"Yeah. Just don't tell anyone about this. EVER." said Raph.

Raph then bent over and allowed his short, green, stubby tail to come out. Casey and Raph must be in some type of relationship because Raph would NEVER let anyone see his tail. Not me, not Leo, not Mikey, not Sensei. ABSOLUTELY NOBODY.

"Can I touch it?" asked Casey.

"NO. You're not allowed to touch it. I'll let you touch it when we reach "that" phase, but for right now, it's off-limits." said Raph.

"Okay, well, is this off-limits?" Casey asked before he unexpectedly kissed Raph on the lips.

April and I looked at each other in disbelief, wondering if what we were seeing was real.

"You know it'll never be." Raph said before he kissed Casey back and the two were in a full-blown makeout session, not too different from what April and I did on a regular basis.

I never would have guessed that Raph and Casey would be in a romantic relationship with each other. It just seemed so…weird. Now, I have never nor will ever be against LGBT relationships. If two guys want to fall in love with each other, I'm not going to stop them. Besides, it would be highly hypocritical for me to call these people "strange" and "not normal", when I myself, a giant mutant turtle, am anything but normal. But still, Raph always had this "ultra-masculine" attitude, always checking bikini pictures on my laptop (which I erased once April and I became a thing) and Casey clearly had a "ladies' man" persona. So, it was bizarre seeing them locking lips with each other.

Part of me wanted to leave and just let them have their private time, but the other part of me wanted to know more and allow Raph and Casey to come out to us. As those two parts of me were battling it out, my elbow accidentally hit the window a little too hard, which caused Raph and Casey to turn around and look out the window, spotting me and April.

And the four of us stared at each other for what felt like hours. All four of us felt exposed.

After a few seconds of nobody saying anything, I decided to break the ice and say, "Hi Raph. Hi Casey." Raph and Casey looked at us and had very pissed-off expressions on their faces.

"What the fuck are you two doing here?" asked Raph.

"April saw you running across the rooftops and we got curious, so we followed you here." I said sheepishly.

"Why? You thought I was going to do something stupid, didn't you?" asked Raph.

"Maybe." I said with an embarrassed look on my face.

"And what about you Red, why are you with gap-tooth?" asked Casey.

I growled at the nickname Casey gave me, but April thankfully stopped me from saying anything stupid.

"We were…um, doing some late-night training. Yeah, late-night training." April said, failing miserably to sound convincing.

"Red, don't lie to me. I've known you since 2nd grade, you're not good at this lying thing. Besides, me and Raph already know that the two of you are an item." said Casey.

"What? How the hell do you know that?" I asked.

"We did the same thing you did. We spied on you and saw you in your lab, making out with April, tongue and all." said Raph.

At that moment, I made a mental note. "Always lock the lab door."

"Okay, so we've all exposed each other. I'm with April and you're with Casey. And Raph, I'm just going to let you know right now that April and I fully support your relationship with Casey. You deserve happiness just like everyone else and if Casey makes you happy and vice-versa, we support you two 100%." I said.

"Damn right. You think we would shun and shame you guys just because you were gay and bisexual? Fuck no. We'll always love you guys and that will NEVER, EVER change." said April.

Raph and Casey looked at each other and allowed us to enter Casey's bedroom.

"You really mean that?" asked Casey.

"Of course. We're all together until the end." said April.

"Yep, family always sticks together." I said.

The four of us then had a big, old group hug and right after we hugged, Raph asked, "How long have you two been together anyway?"

"6 months. We've been together since December. What about you two?" I asked.

"5 months. We started our relationship in January." said Raph.

"Wow. Well what do you know, I just so happen to be the first turtle to have a romantic partner. I guess that makes me superior to you." I said with a cocky smile on my face.

"Keep talking and I'll tell April all about that chart plan you made." Raph threatened.

"And I'll Casey about your little "sock" collection." I said.

Raph was about to fire back, but he stopped himself. "You got lucky, brainiac." Raph said quietly.

For the next half hour, the four of us were talking about how our relationships started, how we told April and Casey's parents, and if we've done anything remotely "raunchy". It was the most fun we've had in a while, especially after dealing with the Foot and the Kraang on a constant, never-ending basis.

While we were all talking about relationships, Raph brought up something rather random.

"You guys notice how Leo and Mikey have been acting lately?" Raph asked.

From what I've seen from Leo and Mikey recently, they surely weren't acting like themselves. Leo was lashing out at Sensei and Mikey was being responsible. It was definitely not normal. They were also disappearing a lot during the day. It was somewhat concerning.

"Yeah, something feels off about them. I'm not sure what." said April.

"Maybe it's just mood swings? We are teenagers, after all." said Casey.

"I think it's a bit deeper than that." I said.

"You know, now I think about it, Kate's been acting weird too." said April.

"Who's Kate?" asked Raph.

"A long-time friend. Me and Casey have known her since the 2nd grade. Recently, she's been very secretive and I don't know why." said April.

"Have you told her about us?" asked Raph.

"No. I haven't told her about you guys yet. She does know about mutants and the Foot Clan though." said April.

"At least she's aware of what's going on." said Raph.

"Wait a minute, what's Kate's last name?" I asked.

"Kasai. Why do you ask?" said April.

"Kasai? Where have I heard that name before?" I thought to myself. I thought about it for almost a minute, until it dawned on me.

Kasai. John Kasai. She's John Kasai's daughter. Holy fuck.

I looked at Raph and he had the same expression as me, wide-eyed and horrified.

"Yo, you guys okay?" asked Casey.

Okay? Oh, I was anything but okay in that moment. April and Casey's friend was the daughter of a man who tried to kill us all. And I thought Bob The Tomato and Larry The Cucumber not technically being vegetables was the most shocking thing I've ever heard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it for Chapter 8. I think it was a nice change pace to not focus on John and instead focus more on Raph and Donnie's personal lives. So, how did you like my portrayals of Raph and Donnie? Out of all the turtles, Raph's personality has changed the least. The only thing different is that he's gay and in a relationship with Casey. Now, from what I've personally seen, a major pitfall for LGBT characters is that writers tend to think that LGBT is a personality trait, even though it's not. Raph and Casey's personalities will not simply be "I'm gay. Look how gay I am.", instead they're still going to act like the egotistical, hot-heads they've always been, who happen to be gay/bi. When it comes to Donnie, I've made him more confident and a bit more egotistical, but he'll still have his awkward nerd moments. I decided to choose Apriltello and Rasey as official ships for this story because one, Apriltello is one of the few ships I can actually get behind, and two, I wanted to give Raph a love interest and I ultimately chose Casey to be his love interest. The next chapter will from the perspectives of multiple different characters because everything will come together and it will be an absolute trainwreck. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.


	9. Secrets Revealed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter will be from the perspectives of Kate, John, Shredder, Leo, Raph, and Mikey. As the title suggests, certain characters will get exposed and all hell will break loose as a result. Hope you're ready for lots of arguing. Enjoy.

Kate's POV

September 29, 2013

Well, today's the day. I'm finally turning 16, which means I can now have my very own Sweet 16 birthday party! And I know this party is going to be the absolute best because not only will Mikey and Leo be there but my favorite godfather in the world, Oroku Saki, promised he would be there too. Hopefully, April and Casey will be there, but I have my doubts about them showing up. Even better, Mikey and Leo are celebrating their "Mutation Day" as well! They call it "Mutation Day" because they don't remember having actual birthdays when they were normal, non-mutated turtles, which genuinely makes me sad. I can't even imagine not remembering my birthday.

Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Kate. Kate Kasai. I'm the daughter of John and Susan Kasai if you didn't know that already. My life has been quite…interesting so far. I mean what are the chances of having a father who is not only a multi-billionaire but also a super-powered mutant who happened to co-lead a crime syndicate? Yeah, they wouldn't be very high. I remember when Dad told me about his mutant powers when I was 8 years old. I thought it was the coolest thing ever. My dad was essentially a superhero, as long as you remove the "hero" part. If there's one word my dad dislikes, it's "hero". He doesn't believe in the idea of heroes, which I personally think is ridiculous but if that's what he wants to believe, then why should I stop him? Well…he is cool with me calling him "my hero", so there's that.

For some strange reason, ever since my 15th birthday, my two best friends, April and Casey, have pretty much ghosted me and I don't know why. I mean we still talked in school but if I wanted to hang out with them, they would always come up with some BS excuse and it really ticked me off. For the longest time, I thought I was the problem until I found out they were associated with the turtles, which explained everything.

Speaking of the turtles, the one turtle I've been constantly thinking about for the last few months was Mikey. He was without a doubt the coolest guy I've ever known. He was funny, kind, always had a great attitude, and he wasn't afraid to tell me if he was upset or disheartened about something. His overly positive attitude could be a bit much at times, but overall, his presence has definitely made my life better. But over time, my feelings for him started to evolve. Instead of seeing him as just a platonic friend, I began to feel…attraction to him, like I wanted to be with him. At first, I couldn't believe what I was thinking. Don't get me wrong, Mikey is a great guy, but…he's not human. He's an animal, a humanoid mutated turtle, he and his brothers even described themselves as freaks of nature. I shouldn't fall in love with him! I would be going against nature! It would be unethical! It wouldn't be right! But after arguing with myself for months, I could no longer deny my feelings for him.

I was in love with Mikey. I was in love with a teenage mutant ninja turtle and judging by how he looked at me, I think he had feelings for me too. The problem was that neither of us wanted to say anything about it. Hell, whenever I said anything about romance, even if it was completely out-of-context, he became uncharacteristically shy and somewhat embarrassed.

As much as I wanted to be in a relationship with him, there was this part of me that was hesitant about it because I was still feeling the scars of my last relationship. Oh, I forgot to mention that. Yeah, I had a boyfriend almost 2 years ago and his name was Zach. And my God, he was an ASSHOLE. I mean he started out okay, he was cool with my parents and he treated me with respect. Then a few months after we started dating, he turned into a scumbag. He was looking at other girls, he constantly interrupted me, and he even allowed one of his asshole friends to slap my ass. It was fucking gross.

Eventually, I couldn't take Zach's shitty behavior anymore and I asked my parents about what I should do. They both told me to leave him because of his "toxic" behavior and if I stayed with him, his behavior would've only gotten worse. So, I took their advice and a few days later, I broke up with Zach. And that was a day I would like to forget.

Flashback: October 28, 2011

It was a Friday night. We just left our school's Halloween party. The party was already bad when we got there but Zach managed to make everything worse. Like most days, he was being a toxic bastard. The piece of shit even tried to force me to drink some punch that was clearly spiked with alcohol. How did I know it was spiked? A decent amount of people at the party were stumbling around, slurring their words, and throwing up on the floor. I'm 100% positive he was going to do some "date-rape" shit to me if I drank that punch. So yeah, I did not have a good time.

Anyways, after the party, I decided I was going to choose this moment to dump Zach. And hopefully never see him again.

"Hey babe, what's wrong?" Zach said in his sleazy voice.

"Don't call me babe." I said with an annoyed tone.

"Come on babe, don't be like that." Zach said before attempting to grab my shoulder.

I immediately backed away from him and said, "Don't you fucking touch me!"

"What the hell is your problem?" Zach yelled.

"You! You're my fucking problem! I've given you numerous chances to fix your behavior and all you do is squander them! All you do is get worse and worse and treat me like shit! Well, guess what? You can go treat someone else like shit because WE'RE DONE!" I yelled.

"What did you say?" Zach asked in a shocked tone.

"We're done. Finished. Finito. IT'S OVER." I said.

"Bitch, you can't break up with me." said Zach.

"Well, I just did. Enjoy the rest of your life. ALONE." I said before walking away.

I took a few steps until Zach roughly pulled my arm towards him.

Then…he punched me right in the face and I blacked out.

When I woke up, I was in a hospital bed. My mom looked at me with concern, while my dad was completely distraught.

"He's dead. That fucker is dead." Dad said before leaving the room.

"Kate, it's going to be okay. Dad will deal with that human piece of garbage and trust me when I say, we will NEVER let anything like this happen to you again." Mom said before giving me a kiss on my cheek.

(End of Flashback)

And that's how my first relationship ended.

As you can imagine, it left some emotional scars that may never heal. I stopped thinking about relationships for more than a year and a half. I got nervous when any boy, not named Casey, tried to talk to me. I changed my style, wearing mostly black and red outfits. I even changed my hair, dying the ends red. My mood got relatively worse and I didn't feel like talking to anyone unless it was April and Casey. It wasn't until I met Mikey when my mood got a lot better.

If you're curious about what happened to Zach, well, let's just say…my dad took care of him and erased him from my life.

But I knew without a shadow of a doubt that Mikey was not Zach, in any way, shape, or form. He wouldn't physically or verbally abuse me because it's not in his DNA to do such a thing. We would treat each other right and hopefully have a lost-lasting relationship.

But before I could tell Mikey anything, I needed to tell my dad first. I needed to know if he was fine with the idea of me dating a mutant. I know his best friends are mutants but there's a clear difference between friendly relationships and intimate relationships.

I opened the door to my dad's bedroom and I saw him cleaning a sword from his weapon's cabinet. This was my chance. Hopefully, he would take it well.

"Um, Dad? Can I ask you about something?" I asked.

"Sure thing, princess." said Dad.

"Dad, you know how I feel about you calling me princess." I said.

"I know. I know. You find it embarrassing but I just can't help myself sometimes. You may be 16 today but you'll always be my sweet little princess. Now what was it that you wanted to ask me about?" said Dad.

"Okay, how would you feel if I wanted to date a…mutant?" I asked.

"A mutant?" Dad asked.

"Yes. A mutant." I replied.

"You're talking about Mikey, are you?" Dad asked.

"Shit. He figured me out." I thought to myself.

"No. Why would I be talking about Mikey?" I said with the worst fake laugh in the history of ever.

"Kate, I'm not blind. I've seen the way you've looked at Mikey and I've seen the way he's looked at you. Susan and I gave each other the exact same looks 17 years ago and those looks are the reason you even exist in the first place. Besides, you yourself are talking to a mutant, RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU. Why the heck wouldn't I allow you to be with Mikey?" said Dad.

"Well, I thought you would say it would be unnatural or something." I said.

"Kate, MY VERY EXISTENCE spits in the face of nature. Do you really think I care about what's "natural" and what's not?" Dad asked.

"Not really." I said.

"Exactly. I'm 100% cool with you being with Mikey. I trust him completely. He's infinitely better than that piece of shit, Zach." said Dad.

"True." I said.

"So, when are you planning on telling him?" Dad asked.

"I wanted to do it today since it's both my birthday and his Mutation Day. I wanted to make it super special." I said.

"And I know it will be very special. Oh, I got a surprise for you." said Dad.

"Really? What is it?" I asked.

"It's someone very special, who promised he would be here today." said Dad.

"No. You're kidding." I said.

"I'm not kidding. He's right outside the door." said Dad.

Being incredibly excited, I dashed to the door and slowly opened it. And what I saw made me explode in happiness.

"Happy birthday, Kate." said Oroku Saki.

I immediately hugged Saki and said, "I'm so glad you're here!"

"I wouldn't miss anything for my favorite godchild. Especially not her 16th birthday." said Saki.

"Saki! My man! What is up?" said Dad as he and Saki gave each other a bro hug.

"Not much. I'm just glad things are deathly slow today." said Saki.

"You shouldn't say that Saki. You know if someone says something like that, shit will always pop up when you least expect it." said Dad.

And boy, was Dad right when he said that.

Mikey's POV

TODAY'S THE FREAKING DAY! GOODBYE 15 AND HELLO 16!

Today's a very special day for my family and it's a day we call "Mutation Day". It's a day where we celebrate our mutation, since we don't have official birthdays. It's kind of sad but it's still a very exciting day for all of us, especially me. Ever since our 10th Mutation Day, I've been assigned with cake-making duties and the results have been very…hit or miss (mostly miss). All I had to work with was algae and worms, so the results were not great. But this year is different because now I have actual cake-making ingredients! I'm hoping to make some decent in order to make up for all the previous botched cakes.

I woke up nice and early at 6 am to prepare the cake. It was going to be at least three layers tall and it would be split into 4 different sections. Each section will be represented by a different color. Blue will be for Leo, purple will be for Donnie, red will be for Raph, and orange will be for me. The four sections will be connected by green icing and on each section, I'll put in some decorations of our respective weapons. Katanas for Leo, a Bo staff for Donnie, sais for Raph, and the best weapon of all, the nunchucks, for me.

The cake took two whole hours to make but when it was done, it was worth it. The cake was everything I'd hoped it be. I just hoped no one would see it before I was ready to present it.

"Now that is an awesome cake, Mikey." said Leo, who walked into the kitchen.

Welp, so much for that.

"Thanks, bro. I really appreciate you MURDERING the surprise I had for the whole family. Why are you even in here? Shouldn't you be asleep? After all, not only is it Mutation Day but it's also a Sunday, so that gives you a double reason to sleep in." I said.

"Mikey, you know my habits. Ever since Sensei made me leader, I've had to wake up at 5 am almost every single day. You can blame that rat for turning me into a super-duper early riser." said Leo.

Ever since Leo started talking to John, he has shown a lot of straight-up hatred towards Sensei. I wasn't exactly sure why Leo talked to Sensei with such contempt, so I asked him why. When he told me what really happened between Sensei, Shredder, and Tang Shen, I WAS PISSED. Sensei lied to us our entire lives and now he's forcing us to fight a battle that HE HIMSELF CAUSED. The dude was an absolute dick.

"Besides, we need to talk." said Leo.

"About what?" I asked.

"Kate. Today's her birthday after all." said Leo.

"I know that. You know it's hard juggling two events, especially since one is a secret we're hiding from everyone. So, what did you get her?" I said.

"I got her some kunai (ninja knives) she can use in case she deals with any of our enemies again." said Leo.

"Good thinking, bro." I said.

"What about you?" asked Leo.

"Well…I'm going to give her a drawing." I said with a smile on my face.

"A drawing? A drawing of what?" asked Leo.

I quickly dashed into my room and pulled out the drawing, before rushing back into the kitchen and showing Leo what I'm going to give to Kate.

"Of this." I said as I showcased the drawing to Leo.

The drawing consisted of me and Kate wearing ghost-hunter outfits and fighting tons of ghosts. It was based directly on Danny Phantom and it was even in the same art style as the show. Since me and Kate were Danny Phantom superfans, it only made sense to make her a drawing based on one of our favorite shows.

Also, I didn't mention this before, but I LOVE art. Drawing, painting, doodling, the whole nine yards. Art has been my passion since I was 6 years old. I've shown some of my work to my family and they've all given me positive feedback. Recently, I've been getting into online art and I even set up a Deviantart page to display my art. In a short amount of time, I gained a small, but loyal fanbase and I made some really good online friends…THAT ARE NOT CHRIS BRADFORD.

"Danny Phantom. Great choice, Mikey. It looks really good." said Leo.

"Thanks bro. How could I not pick DP? After all, he's-" I said.

Leo interrupted me by saying, "Don't. Don't say it."

I had a devious smile on my face as I leaned closer to him and whispered, "He's a phantom."

Leo rolled his eyes and said, "I knew letting you discover that show was a bad idea."

"You're just jealous that my favorite show is actually popular. Unlike yours." I said.

"At least my show didn't have a shitty ending." Leo said with a smug look on his face.

"Touché." I said before putting a cover over the cake.

A few hours later, it was time to celebrate Mutation Day with the family. I gathered everyone into the kitchen and revealed the cake, which caused everyone's, except for Leo's, mouth to drop.

Raph actually gave me a slow clap before saying, "Mikey, you've really outdone yourself. This is incredible."

"Thanks, Raph." I said.

"My sons, I'm grateful we are all here together, alive and well. This past year has been a challenging one. You four have made many enemies but you have also made allies along the way. Hopefully, your war with the Shredder, the Foot Clan, and the Kraang will end within the next year." said Sensei.

Sensei then went on and on and on about philosophical bullshit, while me and Leo looked at each other, wondering when we should leave to go to Kate's place.

While we were all eating cake, which was delicious by the way, Sensei noticed how neither April nor Casey showed up at the lair.

"Where are Ms. O'Neil and Mr. Jones?" asked Sensei.

"Busy." Raph said a little too quickly.

"They're stuck doing a ton of homework this weekend." Donnie added.

I could tell by the way they answered Sensei's question that they were both hiding something. And whatever they were hiding had something to do with April and Casey. I didn't want to bring it up during the party, but I knew something was going on with Raph and Donnie. I just hope it's nothing life-threatening.

"That's too bad. I was hoping they would celebrate with us." said Sensei.

Once me and Leo finished our pieces of cake, we looked at each other and nodded. This was it. It was time to go to Kate's party.

"Um Sensei, do you mind if Mikey and I went out for a few hours?" asked Leo.

"To do what?" asked Sensei.

"To work out and train. We got to be on our toes at all times." I said.

"But it's our Mutation Day. It is a day to relax." said Sensei.

"Well maybe today we want to do something more PRODUCTIVE." said Leo.

"Plus, I need to burn off all the calories I just gained from eating that cake." I said.

Sensei frowned before he sighed and said, "Very well. Be back here before 6 pm. Understand?"

"Hai, Sensei." we said simultaneously before giving Sensei a bow.

We quickly went into our rooms to grab Kate's gifts before rushing out of the lair.

Once we were far enough away, Leo said, "Thank God. I thought he'd never shut up."

"I know, right. I can't believe he still wants us to fight this bullshit war. It's ridiculous." I said.

"Even worse, he's going to put a shit-ton of pressure on me just because I'm the oldest and the leader." said Leo.

"God that sucks. Why doesn't he realize how unhealthy that is mentality?" I said.

"I'm just glad we met John and his family. If we didn't, I would've gone insane by now." said Leo.

"Same here, dude. Let's hope Kate's party goes smoothly." I said before we left the sewers and went up to the surface.

Raph's POV

What a surprise. Leo and Mikey leaving the lair by using a vague-ass excuse. I never would've guessed.

For the past few weeks, me, Donnie, April, and Casey have been talking about how Mikey, Leo, and Kate have coincidentally all been acting weird and secretive. Donnie came up with the theory that Mikey and Leo happen to know Kate and could potentially be in cahoots with John. I didn't want to believe that Mikey and Leo would betray us but anything's possible. So, we decided to initiate "Operation: Exposed" whenever Mikey and Leo would make a shitty excuse to leave the lair. And it just so happens that today was that day.

I quickly texted Casey with, "Operation: Exposed is a go"

He replied back with, "Get here ASAP."

I looked at Donnie, I nodded at him, he nodded at me, and we quickly got up and attempted to leave.

"And where are you two going?" asked Sensei.

"I just got a text from April and Casey. They said they needed help with their homework assignment." I said. That was a complete lie. April and Casey finished their assignment yesterday, but Sensei didn't know that.

"But it is a Sunday." said Sensei.

"It's a weekend assignment, Sensei. April told me it's very time-consuming." said Donnie.

"But why are you going Raphael? Surely, Donatello can help April and Casey by himself." said Sensei.

"Casey wanted me to be there for moral support. To motivate him to concentrate." I said. I really hope Sensei buys it.

"Very well. You may go." said Sensei. YES, HE BOUGHT IT!

"Thank you, Sensei! Enjoy the rest of the cake!" I yelled as me and Donnie ran out of the lair.

Once we arrived at April's apartment, the four of us discussed how we were going to pull this off.

"Okay, I know Kate is celebrating her birthday today and Casey and I know where she lives." said April.

"Since there's a strong chance of Mikey and Leo being at Kate's place, we need to execute our plan relatively close to their location." said Donnie.

"Okay, so as soon as you see Mikey, Leo, or Kate leave the building, that's when I'll strike. Right?" I said.

"Correct. I'll text you if I see any of them leave the building." said Donnie.

"And I got you the perfect disguise." Casey said before throwing me a large, bulky biker suit, some custom three-finger gloves, a dark biker helmet, and a pair of very large boots.

"I got all of the stuff from eBay. I made the gloves specifically for you since you only have three fingers. Finding the right size for your boots was a pain because your feet are so wide and weird looking, so I just got the biggest size I could find." said Casey.

"Thanks, Casey." I said before putting on my outfit. I've never mentioned this before because it's a little embarrassing but before putting on the biker outfit, I've never worn clothes. None of my brothers had any real reason to wear clothes. It's not like we're showing off our turtle bits to anyone. Besides, people would still scream at me if I wore a nice shirt and some slacks, so what's the fucking point of putting on anything?

By far and away, the worst part about wearing this outfit was wearing shoes. Shoes are not my thing and will never be my thing. They made me feel clumsy and I can't have that when I'm in the middle of doing something. It'll kill my reputation.

Once I got the whole outfit on, I asked Donnie, April, and Casey, "What do you think?"

"Dude, you look wicked! You look like you came directly out of a comic book." said Casey.

"It's looks very convincing. Although, you might need to avoid using your hands because if they see your three-fingered glove, it's a dead giveaway." said April.

"Duly noted." I said.

"You might also need a codename. That way no one could tell it's you." said Donnie.

"How about Nightwatcher?" I suggested.

"That's perfect. Plus, it sounds pretty badass." said Donnie.

"Alright, so you'll call Mikey or Leo when you see them outside and tell them that the Nightwatcher is "attacking" April and Casey?" I asked.

"Yep. You need to make sure the fighting looks convincing, otherwise, the plan will go up in smoke. Got it?" said Donnie.

"Got it." I said while giving Donnie a thumbs up.

"Good. Let's do this." Donnie said as we all gave each other a simultaneous high-five and yelled, "GO, TEAM." Sure, it's a cliché chant but we didn't exactly have a name for our 4-person squad. I'll probably come up with something later.

John's POV

Well, Kate's now 16 years old. It's crazy how much time has passed since Kate came into the world via me and Susan. It's even crazier to think about everything that's happened in those 16 years. Gaining mutant powers, becoming a multi-billionaire, meeting Bebop and Rocksteady, meeting Mikey and Leo, all sorts of stuff.

And now it seems she wants to start a relationship with Mikey. Now, I have zero problems with Mikey. He's a good kid with a good heart and a great attitude. Plus, he's fun to be around. But there's this tiny part of me, this overprotective Dad part of me, that's worried Kate's going to get hurt again. After what Zach did to Kate, I wasn't sure I could trust any boy with my daughter. And after what I did to Zach, I don't think any boy wanted to be with my daughter. Because they would have to deal with me.

Flashback: November 5, 2011

A week has passed since Kate was put in the hospital by that piece of shit, Zach. The doctors said she was now free to go home and rest up. The second we got home, I called Casey to ask him about Zach and where he might be located because I wanted to beat him into unconsciousness.

I waited for a few seconds before Casey finally answered.

"Hello?" asked Casey.

"Casey, it's me. It's John. Kate's father." I said.

"Oh, hi Mr. Kasai. How are you?" said Casey.

"Casey, we've been over this. You don't need to call me Mr. Kasai. Just call me John." I responded.

"Sorry, force of habit. So, do you need anything?" asked Casey.

"Yes, I do need something. Do you know a kid by the name of Zach?" I asked.

"Yeah, Kate told me all about him and what he did and…GOD, it makes me want to beat the fuck out of him with my hockey stick! Sorry about the language." said Casey.

"It's fine. You have every right to be this upset. I just wanted to know where he might be located this weekend." I said.

"Why?" asked Casey.

"So, I can have a little "talk" with him." I said with gritted teeth.

"Oh, well, I did hear he's throwing a party at his house tonight. One of his friends gave me an invitation, even though there was NO WAY IN HELL I was going. Again, sorry about the language." said Casey.

"WHERE? TELL ME THE ADDRESS!" I yelled.

Casey quickly told me the address and I wrote it down on a scrap piece of paper.

"Thanks, Casey." I said before hanging up the phone.

Thanks to my teleportation powers, I didn't need to drive all the way to his house. I simply teleported relatively close to his location and walked the rest of the way there. The only weapon I had on me was a metal baseball bat. I didn't feel like bringing anything TOO lethal. I only wanted to pulverize the kid, not kill him. I was also wearing my ninja gear, in order to make sure no one recognized me because if they did, it would be a very awkward conversation.

Once I made it to Zach's house, I loudly knocked on the front door and some teenage girl opened the door to respond to me. I could tell by the way she was moving and by the stench of her breath that she was drinking beer. I wasn't surprised by this. When I was researching American culture, I found out that a sizable number of adolescent youths like to drink alcohol, even though it's illegal to drink under the age of 21. I could've called the cops on them and shut the whole party down but I didn't. That's not what I was there for. Besides, it would be highly hypocritical of me, a co-leader of a deadly crime organization, to demonize anyone for doing a relatively low-level illegal act. Now if you're touching kids, sexually assaulting people, or being a human piece of shit, that's a whole different story.

"Can I help you?" she asked.

"I need to speak to Zach. NOW." I said.

"Wait…are you a cop?" she asked.

"Do I look like a cop?" I replied.

"Sort of. I'm guessing you're here to arrest us. If you are, arrest Megan first. She is such a slut." she said in her drunken stupor.

"I'M NOT A FUCKING COP! NOW, WHERE THE HELL IS ZACH?!" I yelled, my patience was completely gone at this point.

My outburst caused the girl to step back in shock and she said, "He's in the living room."

I quickly made my way inside the house. Loud music was playing on speakers, teens were either socializing or drinking beer, and there was not one adult insight.

Once I entered the living room, I saw him. I saw the motherfucker who put my daughter, my princess, in the goddamn hospital. I didn't waste a single second when I walked up to him and simply said, "Hello Zach.", before delivering a straight punch to his face, knocking him to the floor.

Everyone in the room stopped what they were doing and were now looking at me. I grabbed Zach by his shirt collar, picked him off the ground, and threw him into a glass table, which shattered on impact. A number of the teens were shocked and many gasped at my actions but I didn't care.

I then grabbed Zach's arm and dragged him out of his house. All of the teens followed me, likely curious about what else I was going to do with him.

I stopped dragging him when I got on his front lawn. At this point, I wasn't going to hold back. I grabbed my baseball bat and began my assault.

"So, you like hitting girls? You think it makes you cool? You think it makes you a badass? WELL, IT DOESN'T!" I yelled before kicking him right in the stomach.

"Please…please stop. Please. I'm sorry. I'm…I'm sorry." Zach said while blood was dripping from his mouth.

"Sorry doesn't cut it." I said.

"WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU?!" yelled Zach.

"Your worst fucking nightmare." I said before I rained hell on his bitch ass.

I'm not sure how many times I hit him with that baseball bat, but I think it was around 10. By the time I was done, Zach passed out from the pain and there were nasty bruises on his body.

I then looked at the group of teens who watched the whole thing, before teleporting back to my main house.

I didn't feel much regret for my actions. Anyone who has a brain should know that you never piss off a girl's father, especially if said father had mutant powers and a cold-blooded fighting style.

(End of Flashback)

But I knew without a shadow of a doubt that Mikey will NEVER be another Zach. It's just not in his blood to be an asshole. So, when Kate asked me about it earlier today, I told her I was cool with her being with Mikey. And why wouldn't I be cool with it? Sure, Mikey's a mutant, but so am I. Not to mention that my two best friends are mutants. The only potentially bad thing about Mikey being with Kate is that Mikey and his brothers are… a magnet for trouble. But I tend to be a magnet for trouble too, so it's not that much of a problem.

Speaking of potentially bad things, I'm worried about how Leo and Mikey will react to seeing Oroku Saki at Kate's party. Now, I've already told the two of them Saki was not the enemy and he was a close friend of mine. It still doesn't change the fact that they've been fighting Saki and the Foot Clan for exactly 1 year and all those feelings of bad blood and anger don't just simply disappear.

I didn't even tell them what happened with Saki and the Foot Clan a few months ago because I doubt they would believe it. Hell, I barely believed it until Saki told me in extensive detail.

"So, when Mikey and Leo come over, are you going to tell them?" I asked.

"I should. It will take some time for them to be convinced but it would definitely be for the best." said Saki.

"Let's hope it doesn't lead to a fight." I said while drinking some punch.

Around two minutes passed, before Mikey and Leo came out of the elevator with their gifts.

"We're here!" yelled Mikey.

"And we got gifts for a certain someone's birthday!" yelled Leo.

Kate quickly rushed to greet the two turtles, who presented their gifts to her.

"I got you some kunai. You can use them whenever you end up in a bad situation." said Leo.

"And I made you this drawing. I thought you would like it since we're both huge fans of Danny Phantom." said Mikey.

"Guys, these are so cool! I LOVE THEM! Thank you so much!" Kate said before hugging the two turtles.

"It's no problem, Kate. Happy birthday." said Leo.

"HAPPY B-Day AND M-Day!" said Mikey.

"M-Day?" asked Leo.

"Yeah, our Mutation Day. B-Day means birthday, so M-Day means Mutation Day." said Mikey.

"I guess that makes sense." said Leo.

"So John, how's it go-" Leo stopped himself when he saw Oroku Saki. Both Leo and Mikey drew their weapons out and the only thing I could say in that particular moment was…

"Shit."

Shredder's POV

"Shredder!" Leonardo yelled as he and his brother, Michelangelo, drew out their weapons and pointed them at me.

Great. Just what I needed. All I wanted to do was celebrate my goddaughter's birthday in peace. But I guess that's too much to ask for.

"WOAH! WOAH! WOAH! I AM NOT GOING TO ALLOW A WAR TO TAKE PLACE ON MY DAUGHTER'S BIRTHDAY. NOW, PUT AWAY THE WEAPONS." yelled Susan. It was at this moment I was eternally grateful that John chose to marry this woman.

"John, explain this. WHY IN THE HELL IS THE SHREDDER HERE?" Leonardo said with fury.

"Because I wanted him to be here. I wanted him to celebrate Kate's birthday with me and Susan." said John.

"But why?" asked Michelangelo.

"One, I've known John for over 20 years and he's my closest friend. And two, Kate is my goddaughter." I said.

"Kate's your god-what?" Michelangelo said with a confused tone.

"Goddaughter. I'm essentially her guardian, besides John and Susan." I said.

Michelangelo simply responded with "Oh."

"Well, how do we not know that you're planning something with the Foot Clan?" Leonardo asked me.

"The Foot doesn't even know I'm here." I said.

"And how is that?" Leonardo asked.

I sighed and said, "Because I'm not in the Foot Clan anymore."

As soon as those words left my mouth, the whole room went silent. Both Leonardo and Michelangelo looked highly confused and simultaneously asked, "WHAT?"

"I no longer associate myself with the Foot Clan." I said.

The two turtles looked at each other and laughed, clearly thinking I'm telling a joke, even though the punchline doesn't exist.

"I'm sorry. Are you seriously trying to tell us that you, THE SHREDDER, are OUT of the Foot Clan? Because if you are, that's the funniest shit I've heard all year." said Leonardo.

I was surprised by Leonardo's use of profanity. From what I've personally seen, Leonardo seemed like he was the most mature and respectful out of his brothers. I'm 100% positive he got it from John since John always had a…crude way of expressing his thoughts.

"I assure you I am telling the truth. I left the Foot Clan several months ago." I said.

"And where's your proof? You can't just say things without proper evidence." said Michelangelo.

"I'm his proof. He told me everything that happened in extensive detail. Because unlike your father, Saki is actually honest." said John.

"Okay, then tell us. What made you quit the Foot Clan?" asked Leonardo.

I sighed before telling the two turtles what caused me to break away from the ninja clan that I brought back from the grave.

"For the longest time, I thought I would be happy when Hamato Yoshi was out of my life entirely. I thought that by brutalizing him and by extension his children, all the anger, sadness, and pain I've held in for 16 years would dissipate. It didn't. Like John, I became angry with myself after that night last October. I hated myself for not knowing beforehand that Yoshi brainwashed you into thinking that I started all of this. When John left, the morale in the Clan plummeted. Half of the Foot Soldiers walked out with John and the overall atmosphere was simply terrible. Not to mention that Karai had been doing things BEHIND MY BACK THAT I NEVER APPROVED OF. She made various deals with the Kraang and violent extremist groups, which made everyone uncomfortable. We argued for hours and hours. She refused to accept that she was disrespecting the Clan's legacy. MY legacy. And eventually, I came to the realization that the Foot Clan I knew and built up was dead. Gone. The "new" Foot Clan was a shell of its former self. So, I decided I was done. I didn't want to be apart of this "new" Foot Clan. And I left. Naturally, I was met with some resistance but I quickly took care of that problem. And now, I'm a target of the Foot Clan and although John offered to let me stay at his home, I'm currently living in my own apartment." I said.

The stunned faces of Leonardo and Michelangelo were all I needed to see to know if they believed me or not.

"Wow. That's just…wow." said Leonardo.

"So that's why we haven't seen you for so long? I thought you went on a business trip to Japan or something." said Michelangelo.

"I wish I did." I said simply.

I then walked up to the two turtles and said, "I know I don't deserve your forgiveness. I've done great harm to you and the rest of your family. Nothing can change that. But what I can say is that hurting you and attempting to kill you is something I will NEVER forgive myself for. I'm ashamed of my actions and I wish I could take it all back."

Before I could say anything else, Michelangelo gave me a hug and said, "It's okay. We forgive you."

I was shocked by his words, which made me ask him, "How could you forgive me so easily? After everything I've done?"

"As you said, we were brainwashed. Conditioned to think that you caused all these problems when in reality, it couldn't've been further from the truth." said Leonardo.

"I…I don't know what to say." I said.

"You don't need to say anything, dude. You're cool with us. Not to mention that you're apart of our family since you're technically our uncle." said Michelangelo.

"That is true." I said with a smile.

"Did anyone kill each other yet?" Susan asked from another room.

"No! Everything's fine! No one's dead!" yelled John.

"Good because I am not dealing with any bloodshed today." said Susan.

As I was chuckling at Susan's response, I got this sick feeling that something was going to happen. It would come at the most inconvenient time and it would either lead to injury or tragedy. I know this feeling better than anyone because it's the story of my goddamn life. I've learned that if something bad can happen, it will happen.

Mikey's POV

For some super random reason, Kate wanted me to come outside with her, so she can tell me something "important". I wasn't exactly sure what she meant by that but I went along with it. As long as she didn't sell me out to crazy scientists, I was willing to fulfill her requests.

So we're now standing outside, at the very top of the skyscraper and my God, the view is just unbelievable. You could literally see most of the city from the height we were at.

Kate looked a little nervous like she was afraid of telling me something. I really hoped she wasn't going through anything serious.

"Kate, is something wrong?" I asked, wanting to know what was going on with her.

"Mikey, there's something I've wanted to tell you for quite a while. I was worried about what could happen but after talking with my dad, I'm now comfortable with telling you." said Kate.

"Telling me what?" I asked.

"Mikey, I love you." said Kate.

Of all the things I thought she would say, this wasn't it.

"What?" I asked.

"I love you Mikey. I've had feelings for you for a few months now and I really needed to get it off my chest." said Kate.

"Is…is this real? Is this a prank? Because if it's a prank, then you're just as skilled as me." I said.

"No, it's not a prank. This is me speaking truthfully." said Kate.

I could tell by her eyes that she wasn't bullshitting. She actually did have feelings for me. A girl actually wanted to be with me.

"Wow. Well, I've had romantic feelings about you too, but I never said anything. I thought you would say no because I'm a turtle and you're a human. Plus, I was worried your dad might kill me." I said.

"Mikey, my dad would never kill you. Unlike my last boyfriend, you're actually a good person. You're funny, likable, caring, badass, trustworthy, and you display so much positive energy. I can't imagine being with anyone else but you." said Kate.

"Really? Wow. Thanks. I honestly never thought I would ever find a romantic partner in my life. I was worried that my dad would tell me that humans can't have relationships with mutants and a ninja shouldn't be distracted by romantic feelings." I said.

"Mikey, what your dad told you is bullshit. You deserve happiness, you deserve a great life, and you definitely deserve more than living in the sewers with an awful parent." said Kate.

"True. So, now what?" I asked, legitimately not knowing what to do in this situation.

"Well, we could kiss, if you want to." said Kate.

"Um, sure. I guess." I said, cringing internally at how awkward I was being.

Just as our lips were about to touch, my T-phone started ringing. I looked at the screen and saw that Donnie was calling me. I wanted to punch him so hard for cockblocking me but I let those thoughts go and answered his call.

"Hello, this is Mikey, the coolest turtle in the universe. How can I help you?" I said.

"MIKEY, it's DONNIE! I NEED YOU, ASAP!" Donnie yelled.

"Woah, Woah, Woah. CALM DOWN. What's happening?" I asked.

"Some guy just jumped April and Casey in an alleyway. He calls himself "The Nightwatcher" and I don't think he's here to protect anybody." said Donnie.

"Where are you?" I asked.

"I'm right by a very large skyscraper, near the TCRI headquarters where we lost Leatherhead." said Donnie.

Leatherhead. Just hearing his name brought back sad memories. The poor alligator went through so much at the hands of the Kraang and I was the first person who gave him any type of love. It tore my heart when he sacrificed himself by pulling himself and that Traag monster into Dimension X. I really hope he's still alive because I enjoyed being around him. He made me feel protected and I made him feel loved.

"I'm relatively close. I'll be there shortly." I said before hanging up the phone.

"What's going on?" asked Kate.

"My bro and friends are in trouble. You want to come with me? I could use your skills." I said with a smile.

"Sure. Lead the way." Kate said before the two of us ran back inside.

We quickly rushed to the elevator, hoping no one would bombard us with questions.

"Mikey? Kate? Is everything alright?" asked John.

I was wrong.

"Yeah, I got an emergency call. No big deal. Nothing life-threatening. Bye." I said right before the door closed.

In hindsight, I shouldn't have said that because now I know I just worried everyone. Once again, good job Mikey.

The second we left the skyscraper, we heard screams coming from a nearby alley. We quickly made our way there and when we arrived, we saw some weird, masked biker dude attacking April and Casey. I didn't see Donnie anywhere.

"HEY!" I yelled. The biker dude turned around and stared right at me.

"Step away from my friends. NOW." I said.

"Or what?" The biker dude asked.

"You'll be spending a long time in the hospital." I said before converting one of my nunchucks into a kusarigama and swinging it around, in order to intimidate the biker dude.

"Is that supposed to scare me?" The biker dude asked.

"It should." I said.

"Hmmm. I see you got your little girlfriend with you. I think she outta know that you still wet the bed on an infrequent basis." The biker dude said.

What?! How the fuck does he know that? The only person I've ever told that to was Raph and that was years ago. Unless…

Before I could say anything, Donnie came out of nowhere and stood right beside the biker dude.

"Donnie, what are you doing?" I asked, being very confused.

Then, April and Casey got up like nothing even happened and stood right next to Donnie and the biker dude.

"What…what is this? Seriously, what the hell is this?" I asked.

The biker dude took off his helmet and it turned out to be Raph. Cue the Dun Dun Dun sound.

"Surprise." said Raph.

"Shit. You planned this, didn't you?" I said with anger in my tone.

"Damn right. Now, you're going to tell us everything. You're going to tell us why you and Leo betrayed our family!" yelled Raph.

"Betrayed you? I didn't betray anyone." I said.

"Okay. Keep lying. Because if you don't start explaining shit right now, I will beat the truth out of you, and trust me, Mikey, I'm not pulling any punches this time." said Raph.

Leo's POV

"Did anyone else find that strange?" I asked right after Mikey and Kate rushed to the elevator.

"I certainly did. I doubt it's good." said John.

"I say we follow them. There's a good chance they could get ambushed." said Shredder.

"Good point. Let's go." I said.

"Alright. Grab my hands." John said as Shredder and I grabbed John's hands and the three of us teleported out of John's living room and onto a nearby rooftop.

"Okay, now where are they?" asked John.

We looked around for a bit, until Shredder said, "I see them."

John and I walked to Shredder, looked down, and what do you know? Mikey and Kate were there. With April…and Casey…and Donnie…and Raph, who was wearing a weird biker outfit. And they were all arguing.

Oh. No.

"Oh shit, they found out." I said quietly, even though I was about to have a heart attack.

"Great, just what we need. I fucking jinxed myself." said John.

"I jinxed myself as well. I knew something would happen because something always does happen." said Shredder.

"Why is Raph even wearing that outfit? He hates clothes." I said.

"Must have used it as a disguise." said Shredder.

"And they all ambushed Mikey and Kate?" I asked.

"Precisely. Plus, it's something both John and I would do." said Shredder.

"True fact. But I think we need to get down there because it's looking pretty tense and from what you've told me about Raph, it's only going to get worse." said John.

Shredder and I both agreed with John's words and we all jumped down into the alley, causing the massive argument to stop temporarily.

"Well, look who it is. Mikey's partner in crime." said Raph.

"Raph, it's not what you think." I said.

"It's exactly what I think! You and Mikey have been going behind our backs to be Kasai and Shredder's puppets." said Raph.

"That's not it at all, Raph." I said.

"You probably have a wire on you and the Foot Clan will show up any second to kill us all." said Raph.

"That's not going to happen." said John.

"And why is that?" asked Donnie.

"Because I'm not apart of the Foot Clan anymore and neither is Saki." said John.

Raph laughed before saying, "You're kidding me, right? You're pulling my leg. You know the leg that YOU broke."

"I left the Clan days after I nearly killed your whole family. I hated myself for what I did that night and I still regret it every single day. Saki left the Clan because it was going into a direction that he didn't approve of and I doubt any of you would've liked it either." said John.

"I don't believe you. You're lying. You're fucking lying!" said Raph.

"Okay, then explain why you haven't seen or heard from me in several months. And it wasn't because of a business trip or me coming up with a diabolical plan to take over the world." said Shredder, his last words dripping in sarcasm.

"Shut up! I don't want to hear anything from you! You're a murderous scumbag who put us all in this shitty situation." said Raph.

Shredder looked at me and said, "He has no idea, does he?"

"What?" asked Raph.

"I planned on telling him and everyone else eventually. In a PRIVATE location." I said.

"I have no idea about what?" asked Raph.

"You wouldn't listen to me anyway." I said.

"What makes you think I wouldn't listen?" asked Raph.

"BECAUSE YOU NEVER LISTEN TO ME! You never take anything I say seriously! Any time I give you a simple order during a patrol, you end up doing your own fucking thing! So, why the hell should I tell you anything?!" I yelled.

"Maybe I would listen, if you weren't such an ass all time. If you weren't such a pretentious douchebag, always giving me shit and treating me like shit." said Raph.

"I probably wouldn't have to do that if you didn't have such a piss-poor attitude and an uncontrollable temper. Hell, Splinter might have chosen you to be leader if you weren't such an angry, jealous, vindictive child who brings down others to hide his own insecurities." said Leo.

"Woah Leo. You need to cool it." said Casey.

"Why should I, Casey? It's the fucking truth. And I find it very rich that you complain about me and Mikey doing something behind your backs, yet you do the EXACT SAME THING. You, Raph, Donnie, and April have been doing nothing but calling and texting each other, talking about how you want to "spend more time together". You make up lame excuses to leave the lair almost every day. It's like you're all in relationships with each other or something." I said.

Raph, Donnie, April, and Casey all looked at each other awkwardly, and right before Raph was about to speak, Casey put his hand on Raph's shoulder.

"Dude, you don't have to tell him." said Casey.

"No Casey, I do. Since we're all airing out our dirty laundry, I might as well come out of the fucking closet. Guess what Leo? I'm gay. I like guys. Casey's bisexual. We've been together since January. Donnie and April have been together since December. Happy, Leo? HAPPY?!" said Raph.

Wow. I did not expect that.

"You're gay? Dude, you could've told me! I would've been 100% supportive of you and Casey. Same to Donnie and April." said Mikey.

"You would've made jokes. BAD jokes." said Raph.

"Dude, I make bad jokes all the time. But I know when I shouldn't cross the line. I'm not immature as you think, Raph." said Mikey.

"Same here. I wouldn't make fun of you for liking guys. I mean love is love for Christ's sake." said Leo.

"Well, Sensei would disown me if he found out. So, that's why I didn't tell anyone except Donnie, April, and Casey." said Raph.

"Raph, fuck what your father thinks. There's nothing wrong with being gay." said John.

"And how would you know?" asked Raph.

"Because my two best friends happen to be in a gay relationship with each other and I never gave them shit about their love. As Leo said, love is love. If your father can't accept that, then that's his problem, not yours. Besides, he's a lying piece of shit anyway." said John.

"What do you mean?" asked Raph.

Right before John was about to tell Raph the truth about Splinter, I saw a walking stick being thrown in the air and it landed right in the middle of all of us.

Well, things have now gone from bad to worse.

Splinter jumped off a rooftop and landed right in front of us. He stared at me and my brothers specifically. He looked like he was going to explode in rage.

"Sensei?" said Raph, clearly looking terrified.

"Because of what I've heard, you four are officially disowned. You are no longer my children. Especially you, Raphael. You disgust me. A faggot should never be a ninja." said Splinter.

I wanted to scream at Splinter. Tell him how he couldn't abandon his children. Tell him how he shouldn't hate Raphael because he was gay. But I couldn't. I was numb. I was in shock. And so were my brothers. Thankfully, John tackled Splinter hard to the ground and punched him several times before screaming in his face.

"WHAT TYPE OF FATHER ARE YOU?! DISOWNING YOUR CHILDREN BECAUSE THEY WEREN'T WHAT YOU WANTED?! AND HATING YOUR SON BECAUSE HE'S NOT STRAIGHT?! THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!" John screamed.

"They're disappointments. All of them. They're weak, pathetic, ignorant children. They're a disgrace to ninjutsu." said Splinter.

Oh, the fucking irony of that last statement.

"They're a disgrace? They're the disgrace? Have you looked yourself in a mirror lately because the only disgrace I see is you. And I'm about to expose you for the bastard you truly are." said John.

And for the next 5 minutes, John and Shredder told Raph, Donnie, Casey, and April what REALLY happened between Yoshi, Saki, and Tang Shen. They told them everything. And I mean everything. Saki marrying Shen, Yoshi impregnating Shen, Yoshi never telling Saki, Saki fighting Yoshi, Yoshi inadvertently murdering Shen. They didn't leave out a single detail.

Once the TRUE story was told, Splinter knew he was fucked. He couldn't lie his way out of this. He couldn't use his garbage wisdom to convince any of us that he was a good person. He was scum and he knew it.

But John decided to twist the knife even further than he already did.

"Hey Donnie, you want to know why Timothy's dead?" John asked.

Timothy was a very touchy subject for Donnie. He felt extremely guilty about Timothy's death, so just bringing up his name would cause Donnie to get uncomfortable. And sometimes even volatile.

"When the Foot Clan and I found out that Timothy was a spy, we didn't kill him right away. No, instead we came up with a different idea. We gave your dear old dad a choice. Either he sacrificed his life for Timothy or he saved himself by letting Timothy die. Guess what the motherfucker chose?" said John.

Donnie knew exactly what Splinter chose and my God, Donnie was ANGRY. Now, I've seen Donnie get angry before on multiple occasions. But that was the "Why are you so stupid?" type of anger. This was the "I'm going to murder you" type of anger and it was truly scary.

With zero hesitation, Donnie rushed towards Splinter and beat the living shit out of him. I'm talking punches, kicks, knee strikes, slaps, scratches, you name it. Raph had to pull him off of Splinter as Donnie yelled, "I HATE YOU! I FUCKING HATE YOU!", with tears flowing from his eyes.

After we got Donnie to calm down, I put one of my katanas to Splinter's neck before saying the following:

"Here's what's going to happen. Me and my brothers are going to go back to the lair, we're going to pack our things, and we're going to leave you. FOR GOOD. And if you even try to go near any of my brothers, I WILL KILL YOU with NO REMORSE. UNDERSTAND?"

Splinter was silent. All he did was put his head down in shame. He was so fucking pathetic.

To make sure Splinter didn't try anything, John delivered a running stomp to the back of his head, knocking him out cold.

"Once you get your things, the four of you can stay at my place. There's plenty of room, trust me." said John.

My brothers and I went back into the sewers and entered our home…for the very last time. As we were all gathering our personal belongings, I had this bittersweet feeling in my heart. I mean we lived here our entire lives. Sure, the sewers smelled like shit, but it didn't change the fact that it was our home. It was where we were born, where we lived, where we began our ninja training, where Splinter made me leader, which in hindsight was a horrible decision. I still remember when Splinter gave us our ninja masks and weapons when we were only 7 years old. I was so ecstatic about becoming a ninja and being like Sensei. If only I could tell my past self about the monster that posed as my father.

Right before leaving the lair, I took one last look at the dojo, where Splinter taught me my first kata. It made my heart ache a bit. Sure, Splinter turned out to be an absolute bastard and I wouldn't shed a tear if he died in a ditch, but still…it made my heart hurt.

Once my brothers and I got all our belongings, we put them in the Shellraiser, got inside, and drove out of the lair.

The car ride was deathly quiet. No one wanted to say anything and I don't blame my brothers one bit for the lack of conversations. They were likely still trying to process what happened earlier. How Sensei just abandoned us all and us knowing his REAL origin story. I didn't even want to think what was going through Raph's mind, considering his own father called him a vulgar slur.

When we arrived at John's place, he had a surprised look on his face.

"Didn't know you guys had a vehicle." said John.

"Yeah, it's called the Shellraiser. Mikey came up with the name. We use it for patrol." I said.

"Okay, well, you can park your vehicle in my garage. It's underneath the building." said John.

I parked the Shellraiser with relative ease, reasonably close to John's own car. Once that was done, we grabbed our belongings and followed John to the underground elevator.

While in the elevator, I told John, "Thank you. You didn't have to do this."

"Leo, I want to help you and your brothers. Your parent was terrible. No child should ever have to deal with a terrible parent. You four deserve far better than Hamato Yoshi." said John.

When we made it to the top floor, we put our personal items on the floor and sat down on a large couch. Kate sat right next to Mikey, while April and Casey sat next to Donnie and Raph, leaving me somewhat in the middle.

John, Susan, and Shredder were in a huddle formation, whispering to each other, before turning around and facing us.

"Alright, so…a lot has happened these past few hours. Secrets were revealed. Relationships were discovered. A father abandoned his children. It's quite clear that things will never be the same again. And while change can be terrifying, it can also be a blessing." said John.

"We understand that as much as you're angry at Hamato Yoshi, he is still your father. He raised you from birth and made you into the warriors you are today. We know we can't pretend to be your parents, but we still want to give you all equal amounts of love and support." said Susan.

"So, here's how things are going to go. I have four bedrooms on the top floor. Susan and I share one and Kate has another. Since there are four of you, it will be 2 to a room. Leo will be with Mikey and Raph will be with Donnie. This will only be temporary, as the four of you will soon have separate rooms. I will make a schedule and a set of rules for you to follow very soon." said John.

"And after much thought, I believe it is best for me to move in and join John and Susan as your guardian, in order to help you all heal from your emotional pain. As your nonbiological uncle, it pains me to see my innocent nephews suffer from their father's poor choices." said Shredder.

"Susan, Saki, and I all want you to be happy and live long, fulfilling lives. I know it will be a struggle and there will be heartbreak and suffering, but I promise you, we will NEVER EVER give up on any of you. I will die to make sure you all live the greatest lives imaginable. Understand?" said John.

I looked at my brothers who all responded by nodding to John. Raph looked like he was about to break down in tears at any second.

"Raph, are you okay? Do you need a hug?" John asked softly.

Raph nodded again as tears began to fall down his cheeks. John walked over to Raph and gave him a firm hug. And once John hugged Raph, Raph completely broke down.

As Raph was crying, John said softly, "It's okay. It's okay. Let it all out. You're going to be okay. Everything's going to be okay."

Soon enough, everyone in the room enveloped him in a group hug.

It was definitely a dark day for all of us. But as they say, even in the darkest of places, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it for Chapter 9. Boy, that was A LOT. 26 pages worth of writing, but I think it was definitely worth it. I really hate putting the turtles through so much emotional pain. They don't deserve all the bad shit that's happened to them. Now, three of the four turtles have partners (Mikey/Kate, Donnie/April, and Raph/Casey). Poor Leo is the odd turtle out. I used Raph's Nightwatcher persona from the 2007 movie because I think it's super underrated. Also, I really enjoy writing Mikey as a Danny Phantom fan, it fits him perfectly. The next and final chapter of this story shouldn't be as long this chapter, but it will include a Foot Clan attack, an alien dimension, some fan favorite characters, and an unexpected ending. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now and stay safe.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you found this interesting. As you can tell, this story is drastically different from the ones I usually do. It was based off an idea I had in my head for years and it was only recently that I decided to make it a reality. Also, sorry about the long wait, it took me a ridiculously long time to write this chapter because I had to do extensive research on the TMNT 2012 series. This story will consist of 10 chapters and I’ll writing each chapter like an episode of a miniseries. Next chapter will introduce a love interest for John and revolve around the Foot’s objective to eliminate Hamato Yoshi. Other than that, I hope you all have a wonderful day. Bye for now.


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